Kris Clink's Writing Table: Recent Episodes
Kris Clink
A podcast for writers and book lovers. Whether you’re a newbie-author or a reader, there’s plenty of room at the table to learn from established authors, publicists, bloggers, and creatives. Pull up a chair, because there’s plenty of room at the writing table.
Leslye Penelope has been writing since she could hold a pen and loves getting lost in the worlds in her head. She also writes award-winning fantasy and paranormal romance as L. Penelope. Equally left and right-brained, she studied filmmaking and computer science in college and sometimes dreams in HTML. She hosts the My Imaginary Friends podcast, co-hosts the Ink and Magic podcast, and lives in Maryland with her feline dependents. Her latest novel is: THE INEVITABLE UNDOING OF ZAHARA DOUGLASS.
For more on Leslye Penelope, follow her on Instagram: @leslyepenelope
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Jess Row is the author of the novel Your Face in Mine, the essay collection White Flights: Race, Fiction, and the American Imagination, and two collections of short stories, The Train to Lo Wu and Nobody Ever Gets Lost. His fiction has appeared in The New Yorker, The Atlantic, Tin House, Conjunctions, Ploughshares, Granta, n+1, and elsewhere, has been anthologized three times in The Best American Short Stories, and has won two Pushcart Prizes and a PEN/O. Henry Award. He has received a Guggenheim fellowship, an NEA fellowship in fiction, a Whiting Writers Award, and a Whiting Creative Nonfiction Grant. In 2007, he was named a “Best Young American Novelist” by Granta. His nonfiction and criticism appear often in The New Yorker, The New Republic, The New York Times Book Review, Bookforum, Threepenny Review, and Boston Review, among other venues. He directs the undergraduate creative writing program in the Department of English at NYU and lives in New York City and Plainfield, Vermont. His latest is the shortstory collection titled, Storyknife.
Learn more at jessrow.com
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Chris Bohjalian is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of 26 books ranging from literary fiction, historical fiction, thrillers, and (on occasion) ghost stories. His work has been translated into 35 languages and become three movies and an Emmy-winning TV series. He is a playwright and has two other novels in development for TV series as well. His books have been chosen as Best Books of the Year by the Washington Post, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, the Hartford Courant, and more. His novel, MIDWIVES was a selection of Oprah’s Book Club, and his novel, HOUR OF THE WITCH, was a Barnes & Noble Book Club pick. He is a Fellow of the Vermont Academy of Arts and Sciences. He has written for a wide variety of magazines and newspapers, including The New York Times, The Washington Post, and Cosmopolitan among others. Chris graduated Phi Beta Kappa and Summa Cum Laude from Amherst College. He has been awarded Honorary Degrees as well from Amherst, Champlain College, and Castleton University. He lives in Vermont with his wife, the photographer Victoria Blewer.
Learn more at chrisbohjalian.com
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Lisa Roe graduated from the S. I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University and spent many years as an advertising creative director and copywriter in New York City before she accepted the tougher job of stay-at-home mom and turned to writing fiction —mostly to entertain her kids, but then to tell her own stories. A classic first born, reluctant empty nester, and Dr. Doolittle wannabe, Lisa lives in New Jersey with her husband, David and three incorrigible dogs. Her latest novel is Big & Lily.
Learn more at lisaroe.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for early previews.
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Victoria Lavine’s love of romance novels started in high school with a crate of old bodice rippers and a wink from her local librarian. Now, she writes her own Happily Ever Afters when she’s not enjoying the great state of Maine with her husband and daughter, taking orders from her two cats, or coming up with excellent reasons to make her next latte. Her latest novel is Not that Kind of Proposal.
Learn more at victorialavine.com
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Sarah Flocken is an upmarket fiction author. She is also a public relations professional, comedian, improviser, and pun contest host (yes, it’s a thing). Sarah’s poetry, essays, and short stories were published in school literary journals throughout her teen and early adult years. After that, she turned her attention to building a career in public relations, where she’s written millions of words for other people in the form of op-eds, speeches, press releases, whitepapers, sponsored articles, talking points, Senate floor remarks, and more. She is currently the owner and principal of SLH Communications, a PR consultancy in San Diego, California. Outside of her day job, Sarah has written short plays, sketch comedy and stand-up routines for over 10 years, including a run with the Edinburgh Revue at the 2011 Edinburgh Festival Fringe. Additionally, she is a member of the Women’s Fiction Writers Association. She currently performs with two improv comedy groups in San Diego, and hosts Pundemonium! San Diego’s Only Pun Competition. Sarah received her bachelor’s degree in English and Comparative Literary Studies from Occidental College in Los Angeles, and a master’s in Literature & Modernity: 1900-Present from the University of Edinburgh in Edinburgh, Scotland. She lives in San Diego with her husband. Her new novel is Be Well.
Learn more at SarahFlocken.com
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David Ellis is a judge and an Edgar-award-winning author of ten novels of crime fiction, as well as eight bestselling books co-authored with James Patterson. His novels have been translated into more than ten languages worldwide. In December 2014, Dave was sworn in as the youngest-serving Justice of the Illinois Appellate Court for the First District. He lives outside Chicago with his wife and three children.
Learn more at davidellis.com
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Brianna Labuskes is the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post and Amazon Charts best-selling author of psychological thrillers and historical fiction. Her books have been translated into several languages worldwide. She grew up in Pennsylvania, lived in Washington D.C. for many years, and now lives in in Pennsylvania with her puppy, Jinx.
Her latest novel is CLEAN SLATE.
Learn more at Briannabwrites.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for early previews.
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Amy Archer is from Doncaster, South Yorkshire. She has loved writing since becoming her grandad’s pen-pal at the age of six. Growing up on the boundary of various cricket pitches across the north whilst her brother played, she took to carting a laptop around to scribble down stories, poetry and copious amounts of fanfiction. Since then, Amy had graduated from Faber Academy and was longlisted for the Lucy Cavendish Fiction Prize in 2022. She now spends her time writing about all things fantastical. Her debut novel is Nemesis Mine.
Learn more by following Amy on Instagram at amyelizaarcher
Special thanks to NetGalley for previews.
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Brooke Fast is a lover of dystopian, fantasy, and all things romance. When she’s not writing new worlds, you can find her curled up on the couch with her husband and their pups in their self-built tiny house in the mountains of Maine. She’ll either be consuming copious amounts of coffee and thumbing through the latest romantasy release or sharing book reviews and writing snippets under her alter-ego, @librarybrookes.
To Cage a Wild Bird is her first novel.
Learn more at authorbrookefast.com
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Writing domestic suspense under the pseudonym Cleo Ballard, Nan Fischer also writes young adult novels, such as When Elephants Fly and The Speed of Falling Objects. Additional author credits include Junior Jedi Knights, a middle grade Star Wars trilogy for LucasFilm, and co-authored sport autobiographies for elite athletes including #1 ranked tennis superstar Monica Seles, Triple Crown race winning jockey Julie Krone, Olympic gold medal speed skater Apolo Anton Ohno, legendary gymnastics coach Bela Karolyi, and Olympic gold medal gymnasts Nadia Comaneci and Shannon Miller. A graduate of Cornell University and former Traveling Writer for Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus and Senior Campaign Writer for The University of California, San Francisco, Nan’s articles have appeared in Harper’s Bazaar, Reese Witherspoon’s Hello Sunshine, The Huffington Post, Powell’s Book Blog, YA Books Central, Germ Magazine, Hypable, and School Library Journal. She lives in the Pacific Northwest with her husband, Henry, and the spirit of their always lovable Vizsla, Boone. When she’s not conjuring a new commercial fiction novel or thrillers or reading, Nan can be found outdoors, biking, kitesurfing, winging, skiing or planning her family’s next adventure.
Learn more at nanfischerauthor.com
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Stephanie Mack is an author, speaker, and podcast host with a passion for the art of great storytelling. Her novels blend women’s fiction and romantic elements with meaningful insights for readers navigating the complexities of modern life. Throughout her career, she has been trusted to craft language for individuals, publications, and Fortune 500 companies. As a podcast host, she has interviewed numerous New York Times bestselling authors and literary stars. Stephanie’s work has also appeared on Scary Mommy, Faithit, Coffee + Crumbs, and more. Stephanie lives in Orange County, California, with her husband and three daughters, balancing motherhood, creativity, and community. She invites readers to connect with her on social media and through her newsletter where she shares book recommendations, behind-the-scenes insights, and conversations about life and womanhood. Her latest novel is TWENTY SOMETHING ELSE.
Learn more at stephaniemack.com
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Kate Khavari is the USA Today bestselling author of fiction ranging from historical mysteries to high fantasy epics. She has her parents to thank for her fascination for historical mysteries, as she spent the majority of her childhood memorizing Sherlock Holmes’s and Poirot’s greatest quips. A former teacher, Kate has a deep appreciation for research and creativity, not to mention the multitasking ability she now relies on as an author and stay at home mom. She lives in the Dallas-Fort Worth area of Texas with her husband, children, and a lovely garden that contains absolutely no poisonous plants. Her latest novel is A BOTANTIST’S GUIDE TO TRADITION AND TREACHERY.
Learn more at kkhavari.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for early previews.
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What does it take to fold a lifelong career in cardiology into one as a successful thriller writer?
Dr. Cristina LePort, accomplished cardiologist and Amazon bestselling author, captivates readers with her medical thrillers, which merge her rich medical background with gripping narratives. Cristina’s novels, including Dissection, Change of Heart, and Defrosted offer a unique blend of suspense, medical insight, and ethical exploration. Her journey from Italy to the U.S. and transition from medicine to writing highlights her resilience, intellectual curiosity, and dedication to storytelling. Cristina’s work stands at the crossroads of medicine and literature, engaging readers with tales that resonate with authenticity and depth. Born in Bologna, Italy, she graduated Summa cum Laude from the University of Bologna, completed her internship and Internal Medicine residency at the Long Island College Hospital in Brooklyn, NY, and her cardiology training at the VA UCLA. She is board-certified in Internal Medicine, Cardiovascular Diseases, and Nuclear Cardiology, and is the Chief Medical Officer and co-founder of Genescient, a biotech company devoted to genetic research on aging and longevity. She lives in Corona del Mar, Southern California, with her husband Peter. They have 3 children and 3 grandchildren. Her latest novel is DEFROSTED.
Learn more at cristinaleport.com
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Jasper Craven is an investigative journalist covering the military and veterans’ issues. His writing has appeared in Harper’s, Politico, The Intercept, The Boston Globe, and The New York Times. He is also a fellow at the Veterans Healthcare Policy Institute. His latest book is God Forgives, Brothers Don't.
Learn more by following Jasper at @Jasper_Craven on X and @jaspercraving on Instagram.
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Eloisa has published over 30 historical romances, many of which have hit the bestseller lists. She also wrote a bestselling memoir, Paris in Love, as well as a contemporary novel, Lizzie and Dante. Her books are published in 28 languages and 30 countries, from Slovakia to Sweden. Worldwide, she has approximately 7 million books published in print or electronically. She lives in New York City and Florence, Italy. After graduating from Harvard University, Eloisa got an M.Phil. from Oxford University, a Ph.D. from Yale and eventually became a Shakespeare professor, publishing an academic book with Oxford University Press. Her "double life” as a professor and romance writer is a source of fascination to the media and her readers. In her professorial guise, she's written a New York Times op-ed defending romance, as well as articles published everywhere from women's magazines such as More to writers' journals such as the Romance Writers' Report. Her latest novel is THE LAST LADY B. Learn more at eloisajames.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for early previews.
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Debut novelist Andrew Forrester is a writer and former English teacher whose work has appeared in McSweeney's and Parents magazine. He holds a PhD in nineteenth-century British literature and lives in Austin, Texas, with his family. How the Story Goes is his first novel.
Learn more at andrewforresterbooks.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for early previews.
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Kate Clark Stone’s fiction features strong and vulnerable heroines, a lot of heart, and endless love for flyover states. Kate attended her first Indianapolis 500 at six years old and wrote her first book at eleven. A former attorney, Kate relishes watching fast cars, swimming and paddling sports, the Oxford comma, and traveling here/there/everywhere. Kate lives in southeastern Tennessee with her husband, children, and two very good dogs. While Kate has lived in the South for decades, she is and will forever be a Hoosier at heart. Her debut novel is called THE LAST SUNDAY IN MAY.
Learn more at kateclarkstone.com
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Jennifer Chiaverini is the New York Times bestselling author of thirty-six novels, including critically acclaimed historical fiction and the beloved Elm Creek Quilts series. In addition to her novels, Jennifer has created six collections of quilt patterns inspired by her books. A graduate of the University of Notre Dame and the University of Chicago, she lives with her husband and two sons in Madison, Wisconsin. About her historical fiction, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel writes, "In addition to simply being fascinating stories, these novels go a long way in capturing the texture of life for women, rich and poor, black and white, in those perilous years." Her latest novel is THE PATCHWORK PLAYERS.
Learn more at jenniferchiaverini.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for early previews.
Jennifer Chiaverini has been combining two analog hobbies since 1999: Reading and Quilting. Chiaverini’s bestselling series, Elm Creek Quilts, centers around Elm Creek Manor and the generations of quilters who practice their craft there. Through quilting, characters build beautiful relationships, face difficult truths, and learn more about themselves in the process.
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Sally Kilpatrick discusses how growing up in a rural area and being raised by a librarian informed her decision to become a novelist. She illustrates how the novel, Wuthering Heights, and the 2026 film vary in the way each manages consent between romantic partners, and introduces her latest novel, Little Miss Petty.
Sally is the USA Today bestselling author of seven novels and counting. She has won multiple awards, including the Georgia Author of the Year, the Maggie Award of Excellence, the Booksellers’ Best, and the Nancy Knight Mentorship Award. She lives in California with her husband, two kids, and two cats.
Learn more at sallykirkpatrick.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for an advance copy of Little Miss Petty.
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Alice Henderson discusses the challenges of writing thrillers set in nature, her adventures in plotting, and how listeners can contribute their own regional climactic observations to ecological research. Plus, she offers a preview into the latest installment of her Alex Carter thriller series, Storm Warning.
Alice Henderson’s love of wild places inspired her new thriller series, which begins with A Solitude of Wolverines, as well as her novel Voracious, which takes place in Glacier National Park. Alice is a dedicated wildlife researcher. Using a variety of methods including bioacoustic studies, she undertakes wildlife surveys to determine what species are present on lands that have been set aside for conservation. There she ensures there are no signs of poaching and devises ways to improve habitat. Using geographic information systems (GIS), she also designs wildlife corridors and builds habitat suitability models and species distribution models. She has surveyed for the presence of grizzlies, wolves, spotted owls, wolverines, jaguars, endangered bats, and more. She has also written media tie-in novels, including official novels for the TV shows Supernatural and Buffy the Vampire Slayer. While working at LucasArts, she wrote material for several Star Wars video games. She was selected to attend Launchpad, a NASA-funded writing workshop aimed at bringing accurate science to fiction. She holds an interdisciplinary master’s degree.
Learn more at alicehenderson.com
More information about the topics Alice discussed:
US Phenology Network
Nature’s Notebook
American Pika
North American Pika Consortium
Irina Shapiro
James Rollins
Graham Brown / Clive Cussler
Special thanks to NetGalley for early novel previews.
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Shea Serrano is an American author, journalist, humorist, and former teacher. He is best known for his work with the sports and pop culture websites, The Ringer and Grantland, as well as his books, including The Rap Year Book, Basketball (and Other Things) and Movies (and Other Things), all of which were The New York Times #1 best-sellers. Serrano lives in San Antonio, Texas with his wife, Larami Serrano, their three sons, and their French bulldog Younger Jeezy. Shea and Larami met in college in 2000 and were married in a hospital after Larami was hospitalized the day before their wedding.
His latest book is Expensive Basketball.
Find him on Instagram at Shea.serrano.
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Jessi Cole Jackson grew up in rural Michigan surrounded by lakes, cornfields, and hard-working pragmatists who would never call themselves artists, despite woodworking, sewing, baking, flower arranging, building, drawing, and crafting. Thus, it took her twenty long years to accept that she was, in fact, creative, just like everyone had been telling her all along. But she wasn’t quite ready to admit her true dream of writing, so she studied and pursued a backup career: theatre.
Jessi spent twelve years building costumes for various award-winning theatres in Cincinnati, DC, Philadelphia, Princeton, and the north shore of Boston. After getting an MFA in writing at Hollins University–where she honed her craft and found her people–she left theatre and moved back to rural Michigan where she lives with her family, has a very practical day job, and rarely calls herself an artist despite sewing, amateur sculpting, embroidering, and, of course, writing. Jessi has published various short stories, mentored emerging writers. RUINOUS CREATURES is her debut novel.
Learn more at JessiColeJackson.com
Thanks to NetGalley for early previews.
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What does an author do when her debut novel becomes an instant bestseller? Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney went right back to work on her next one, and her next-also instant hits. In this episode, Cynthia discusses growing up in the seventies, her hometown, and her parents' book collection influenced her latest novel, Lake Effect. People Magazine calls Lake Effect: “Astute and immersive with a surprising twist.”
Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney is the author of the instant New York Times bestselling novels The Nest (named a best book of the year by People, the Washington Post, and NPR) and Good Company (a Read with Jenna selection). She has been a guest on Today, Late Night with Seth Meyers, and NPR’s All Things Considered. Her work has been translated into more than 28 languages, and The Nest is in development as a limited series with AMC Studios. Sweeney holds an MFA from the Bennington Writing Seminars. She and her husband live in New York City. Her latest novel is LAKE EFFECT.
Learn more at daprixsweeney.com
Thanks to NetGalley for early preview copies.
Ragdale Writing Residencies
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Inspiration doesn't always find authors at their desk, and it doesn't give a darn about deadlines. Where does a creative go when the muse is silent?
Nick Petrie's back at the Writing Table. He shares his secrets to writing adventure-filled thrillers and provides accessible tactics everyone can use to to refill their creative well.
Plus a peek at what goes into his Peter Ash novels. This is a fun episode, y'all.
Nick Petrie received his MFA in fiction from the University of Washington and won a Hopwood Award for short fiction while an undergraduate at the University of Michigan. His story “At the Laundromat” won the 2006 Short Story Contest in The Seattle Review, and his first novel, The Drifter, won the ITW Thriller and Barry Awards. It was also nominated for Edgar, Anthony, and Hammett Awards. He won the 2016 Literary Award from the Wisconsin Library Association and was named one of Apple’s 10 Writers to Read in 2017. Light It Up was named the Best Thriller of 2018 by Apple Books. Light it Up, The Wild One and The Price You Pay were shortlisted for the Barry Award. A husband and father, he has worked as a carpenter, remodeling contractor, and building inspector. He lives in Milwaukee, where he is hard at work on the next Peter Ash novel. His latest novel is THE DARK TIME.
Learn more at nickpetrie.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for early previews.
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Regarded as a master of suspense, Lisa Unger stops by the Writing Table to talk to Kris about her writing career and how she channels inspiration into suspense-packed novels.
Lisa Unger is the New York Times and internationally bestselling author of twenty-three novels. Her books have been published in thirty-three languages with millions of copies sold worldwide Unger’s critically acclaimed novels have been featured on “Best Book” lists from the Today Show, Good Morning America, Entertainment Weekly, People, Amazon, Goodreads, L.A. Times, The Boston Globe, Sun Sentinel, Tampa Bay Times and many others. She has been nominated for, or won, numerous awards including the Strand Critics, Audie, Hammett, Macavity, ITW Thriller, and Goodreads Choice. In 2019, she received two Edgar Award nominations in the same year, an honor held by only a few authors including Agatha Christie. Her short fiction has been anthologized in The Best American Mystery and Suspense, and her non-fiction has appeared in The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Daily Telegraph, NPR, and Travel+Leisure. Lisa is the current co-President of the International Thriller Writers organization. She lives on the west coast of Florida with her family. Her latest novel is Served Him Right.
Lisa mentioned Julia Cameron's The Artist's Way during this episode.
Learn more at lisaunger.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for an early peek at Served Him Right.
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Linda Rhodes began her career as a dairy cow veterinarian after she graduated from the University of Pennsylvania summa cum laude in 1978. After several years in dairy practice, she was granted a fellowship at Cornell University, where she obtained her PhD in 1988. The rest of her career was spent in the pharmaceutical industry, helping to develop medicines for many species of animals. She retired in 2016 and has subsequently served on several corporate and start-up boards in the animal health industry. She has received the Iron Paw Award for her lifetime achievements. Breaking the Barnyard Barrier is her first book.
Lean more about Linda Rhodes at lindarhodes.com.
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Kate White is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of eleven psychological thrillers. In addition to writing stand-alone psychological thrillers, Kate is the author of eight Bailey Weggins mysteries. The most recent, SUCH A PERFECT WIFE, was nominated for an International Thriller Writers Award. She is a frequent speaker at libraries and conferences and loves to share her strategies for Fearless Reinvention or offer her nine best tips for writing a page-turning thriller or mystery. The former editor-in-chief of five major magazines, including Cosmopolitan for 14 years, Kate is also the author of several popular career books, including the groundbreaking Wall Street Journal bestseller WHY GOOD GIRLS DON'T GET AHEAD BUT GUTSY GIRLS DO. Kate is an avid traveler and spends each winter with her husband at their home in Uruguay. She holds an honorary doctorate of letters from her alma mater, Union College, where she gave the 2022 commencement address.Her latest novel is I CAME BACK FOR YOU. Learn more at katewhite.com
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New York Times and USA Today bestselling novelist Joshilyn Jackson’s books have been translated into a dozen languages, won SIBA’s Novel of the Year award, three times been the #1 Book Sense Pick, twice been the #1 Indie Next Pick, twice won Georgia Author of the Year, been a top ten finalist in the Goodreads Choice Awards, been the Target Book Club Pick, three times been a Books-A-Million Book Club Pick, four times been shortlisted for the Townsend Prize for Fiction, been a finalist for the Willie Morris Award for Southern Fiction, and won the Patricia Winn Award for Southern Fiction.
A former actor, Jackson reads the audio versions of both her own novels and other writers’ books. Her work in this field has been nominated for the Audie Award, included on AudioFile Magazine’s best of the year list, won three Earphones Awards, made the Audible All-Star list for highest listener ranks/reviews, and garnered three Listen Up Awards from Publishers Weekly. She lives in upstate New York with her family and a motley crew of black and white animals. Her latest novel is Missing Sister.
Learn more at Joshilynjackson.com
Special thanks to NetGalley.
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Hays Trott Blinckmann is a writer, journalist, teacher, and recovering painter. She holds a Bachelor of Arts from Tufts University and a Bachelor of Fine Arts from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. She has written the novels: In the Salt, Where I Can Breathe, Here, Kitty, and the young adult novel Yell Out Loud, and lives in Key West, Florida, with her husband and two sons. Her latest novel is Tiny Little Earthquakes.
Learn more at authorhaysblinckmann.com
Click here to see Hays discussing Tiny Little Earthquakes on Good Morning America during the book's February 17th launch week.
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Sofia Robleda is a Mexican writer who spent her childhood and adolescence in Mexico, Saudi Arabia and Singapore. She completed her undergraduate and doctorate degrees in psychology at the University of Queensland, in Australia. She currently lives in the UK with her husband and son, and splits her time writing, raising her son, and working as a psychologist, supporting people with brain injuries and neurological conditions. Her latest work is THE OTHER MOCTEZUMA GIRLS.
Learn more at sofiarobleda.com
Thanks to NetGalley for early review copies.
Sofia recommended The Moor's Account by Laila Lalami.
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How does an ice skater move forward when her Olympic hopes are dashed? This isn't the logline for a novel, but Wendy Walker's true story.
Wendy Walker is the author of the psychological suspense novels All Is Not Forgotten, Emma In the Night, The Night Before, Don’t Look For Me, What Remains, American Girl and the Audible Original audio play, Mad Love. Her novels have been translated into 23 foreign languages, topped bestseller lists both nationally and abroad, and have been optioned for both television and film. Wendy holds degrees from Brown University and Georgetown Law School. Prior to her writing career, Wendy trained for competitive figure skating, worked as a financial analyst at Goldman Sachs, and practiced both corporate and family law. She resides in Connecticut where she raised her three sons. Her latest novel is Blade.
Learn more at wendywalkerbooks.com
Special thanks to NetGalley.
Check out The Room Next Door, Wendy's Audible Original featuring Julia Whelan among the talented cast of narrators.
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Kaira Rouda is an award–winning, USA Today and Amazon Charts bestselling author of contemporary fiction that explores what goes on beneath the surface of seemingly perfect lives. Her novels of domestic suspense include The Widow, Somebody’s Home, The Next Wife, The Favorite Daughter, Best Day Ever, All the Difference and more. Beneath the Surface has been optioned for a feature film. To date, Kaira’s work has been translated into more than a dozen languages. Three of her novels have been named Amazon Editor’s Picks for Best Mystery, Thriller & Suspense. The Next Wife was named a Suspense Magazine’s Best Book of 2021 Award, and a 2022 Silver Falchion for Best Suspense Novel and a 2022 Silver Falchion first runner-up for Best Book of the Year. She lives in Southern California with her family and is working on her next novel. Her latest novel is WE WERE NEVER FRIENDS.
Learn more at Kairarouda.com
The Killer Author Club
Special thanks to NetGalley for early preview copies.
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Kristine Delano spent over twenty years navigating a career on Wall Street before trading her panoramic city view for her standing writer's desk where she crafts thriller novels set in the high-stakes finance world, exploring the emotional tension of work-life balance. In pursuit of compelling stories, Kristine hosts the popular podcast We Talk Careers, where she interviews the voices of Wall Street on leadership, growth, and purpose. When she's not writing, Kristine enjoys playing games with friends, scuba diving, and chasing her husband and children down the snowy ski slopes of western Maine—never does she catch them, but with joy she tries. Her latest novel is The Lies We Trade.
Learn more at kristinedelano.com
Special thanks to NetGalley.
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Amy Meyerson is the acclaimed author of the internationally bestselling The Bookshop of Yesterdays, The Imperfects, and The Love Scribe. Her books have been translated into eleven languages and are frequently chosen for best-of lists, including lists from Good Morning America, Publishers Weekly, The Christian Science Monitor, Library Journal, The Philadelphia Inquirer, and the Texas Library Association’s Lariat List, among others. Meyerson completed her graduate work in creative writing at the University of Southern California, where she now teaches in the writing department. Her latest novel is The Water Lies.
Learn more at amymeyerson.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for early preview copies.
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Jessica L. Cozzi crafts swoon-worthy romances for teens to show that there is always love in the world, if you’re willing to find it. She is a publicist at William Morrow, an imprint of HarperCollins, and is also a former YA book blogger. She has a BA in Creative Writing from Fordham University and an MFA in Young Adult Fiction Writing & Professional Writing from Southern New Hampshire University. Her literary passion lies in Young Adult stories, including any and all contemporary romantic comedies. Through the stories she puts on bookstore shelves, she gives readers the chance to flip through the pages, fall in love, and find their inner hopeless romantic. Her first novel is We’ve Hit Turbulence.
Learn more at jesscozziwrites.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for early preview copies.
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Jacqueline Mitchard is the New York Times bestselling author of 23 novels for adults and teenagers, and the recipient of Great Britain’s Talkabout prize, The Bram Stoker and Shirley Jackson awards, and named to the short list for the Women’s Prize for Fiction. Her first novel, The Deep End of the Ocean, was the inaugural selection of the Oprah Winfrey Book Club, with more than 3 million copies in print in 34 languages. Mitchard’s essays also have been published in magazines worldwide, widely anthologized, and incorporated into school curricula. Her latest novel is The Bird Watcher.
Learn more at: JacquelineMitchard.com
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Brooke Warner is publisher of She Writes Press, an imprint of The Stable Book Group. She is a memoir coach and author of Write On, Sisters!, Green-light Your Book, What's Your Book?, and three books on memoir. She’s also a TEDx speaker (“Green-light Revolution”), weekly podcaster (of “Memoir Nation” with co-host Grant Faulkner), and publishes a weekly newsletter, Writerly Things, on Substack at brookewarner.substack.com.
Learn more at brookewarner.substack.com
For information on Brooke's Magic of Memoir classes, visit magicofmemoir.com.
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Christina Kovac sits down with Kris to talk about living and writing in and around her Georgetown, DC home.
Christina writes psychological suspense/thrillers set in Washington, DC. Prior to writing fiction, Christina worked in television news, covering crime and politics at Fox 5’s Ten O’Clock News in Washington, DC, and after that as a news producer and desk editor at the Washington Bureau of NBC News. She lives outside Washington DC with her family. She loves morning writes with her cat on her lap, ballgames at Nationals Park, book hauls from her town library, and hiking national parks. Her favorites—C&O Canal National Park, Assateague Island, and Rock Creek Park—provided inspiration for Watch Us Fall. She’s currently at work on her third novel. Her latest is Watch Us Fall.
Learn more at ChristinaKovac.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for early review copies.
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Gareth Russell is a historian and broadcaster, educated at Oxford University and Queen’s University, Belfast. He is the author of nine books. He is host of the podcast Single Malt History with Gareth Russell. Russell divides his time between London and Belfast, Northern Ireland. His latest book is The Six Loves of James I.
Learn more by following Gareth at Instagram: @_garethrussell; Twitter: @garethrussell1.
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Yasmin Angoe is an action and psychological suspense thriller author, Library of Virginia People’s Choice Fiction Award finalist, and Anthony-award nominee of the critically acclaimed international Her Name is Knight and domestic psychological suspense Not What She Seems. She is a first-generation Ghanaian American and received the 2020 Eleanor Taylor Bland Award for Emerging Writers of Color from Sisters in Crime. Yasmin’s books were featured as Amazon’s Best Book of the Month for Mystery, Thriller & Suspense, and an Editor’s Pick. Her work has received numerous recognitions, was on a billboard in Times Square, Best Of lists, and a Library Journal Starred Review. The Nena Knight series is also optioned for a TV/Film adaptation.
Her Name Is Knight has appeared in the New York Times Book Review, OprahDaily.com, POPSUGAR, Nerd Daily, the Washington Independent Review of Books, The Guardian, and other platforms. Not What She Seems was a 2024 Goodreads Choice Awards Nominee for Mystery & Thriller. Yasmin is an active member of several organizations such as Crime Writers of Color, Sisters in Crime International, Author’s Guild, Mystery Writers of America, International Thriller Writers, The Crime Writer’s Association, and the Women’s National Book Association. Yasmin is a former English teacher and instructional coach, and lives in South Carolina with her husband and their kids. Her latest novel is Behind These Four Walls.
Learn more at: yasminangoe.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for early preview copies.
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Elle Marr is the author of thrillers THE MISSING SISTER (2020), LIES WE BURY (2021), STRANGERS WE KNOW (2022), THE FAMILY BONES (2023), THE ALONE TIME (2024), and YOUR DARK SECRETS (July 30). She is (evidently) a fan of coffee. Her work has been featured in PopSugar, Woman’s World Magazine, Goodreads, Audible, and TV affiliates for CBS, ABC, FOX, and NBC. THE MISSING SISTER was a #1 Amazon bestseller and an Amazon Charts bestseller, while LIES WE BURY earned a Kirkus starred review, and STRANGERS WE KNOW was an Audible Most Anticipated Thriller. Publishers Weekly gave a starred review to THE FAMILY BONES, saying “Readers will be captivated from the very first page.” THE ALONE TIME was chosen as the Amazon First Read, while Library Journal said it has “a finale that will surprise even the most perceptive readers.” Originally from Sacramento, Elle Marr graduated from UC San Diego before moving to France, where she earned a master’s degree from the Sorbonne University in Paris. When not working on her next book, she enjoys watching French Netflix shows with the subtitles off, in Oregon, where she lives with her family. Her latest novel is Your Dark Secrets.
Learn more at ellemarr.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for a review copy of Elle's new book.
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BEVERLY JENKINS is the recipient of the 2018 Michigan Author Award by the Michigan Library Association, the 2017 Romance Writers of America Lifetime Achievement Award, as well as the 2016 Romantic Times Reviewers’ Choice Award for historical romance. She has been nominated for the NAACP Image Award in Literature and was featured in both the documentary Love Between the Covers and on CBS Sunday Morning. Since the publication of Night Song in 1994, she has been leading the charge for inclusive romance and has been a constant darling of reviewers, fans, and her peers alike, garnering accolades for her work from the likes of The Wall Street Journal, People magazine, and NPR. Her latest novel is CALLING ALL BLESSINGS.
Learn more at beverlyjenkins.net
Special thanks to Net Galley for advance review copies.
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Kelsey Miller is a culture writer based in Brooklyn, New York. She is the author of international bestseller, I'll Be There For You (2018), a pop-culture history of Friends, and the memoir Big Girl (2016). Her work has been featured in New York Magazine, Glamour, Medium, Women's Health, Vulture, Entertainment Weekly, Literary Hub, Refinery29, A Cup of Jo, and more. OLD MONEY is her first novel.
Learn more at kelseymiller.com
Special thanks to Net Galley for an advance review copy.
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Debut novelist Amy Rossi shares her journey as she launches The Cover Girl.
Amy Rossi received her MFA from Louisiana State University, and she lives in North Carolina, by way of Massachusetts, with her partner and two dogs. The Cover Girl is her first novel.
Learn more at amyrossi.com
Special thanks to Net Galley for an early preview copy.
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Lori Gold discusses her transition from writing young adult to commercial book club fiction. She and Kris chat about writing in the age of Artificial Intelligence. Lori discusses her current works-in-progress, teaching other writers through Grub Street Center for Creative Writing, and her latest novel, Romantic Friction which Sally Hepworth, New York Times bestselling author of Darling Girls, describes: “Relatable characters, sharp writing, and emotional turbulence will make you laugh and cry." Amy Tintera, author of Listen for the Lie, calls it "Smart, funny, and unpredictable."
Gold is the author of four novels for young adults as well as an adult historical novel (all under Lori Goldstein). She teaches creative writing at Grub Street in Boston and lives on the South Shore of Massachusetts. Her latest novel, ROMANTIC FRICTION, was included in Zibby Media’s Most Anticipated Books of 2025.
Learn more at www.lorigoldsteinbooks.com.
Click the links to learn about Lori's teaching, her current plotting and querying classes available, or Grub Street Center for Creative Writing.
Special thanks to NetGalley for advance review copies.
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Kelly Foster Lundquist explores the secrets of her first marriage, how she found the courage to love again, and what it took to share her story with readers.
A teacher of writing at North Hennepin Community College in Brooklyn Park, MN. Lundquist is originally from Mississippi and has taught writing all over the United States (Boston, Chicago, Mississippi, Seattle, California, etc), as well as in Slovakia and Scotland. Her poetry and nonfiction can be seen in many places, including Villain Era Lit, Last Syllable Lit, Whale Road Review, and Image Journal. Her work has been nominated for a 2024 Best of the Net Award as well as a Pushcart Prize. She is the recipient of grants from the Minnesota State Arts Board as well as the Central Minnesota Arts Board. She lives in a little red house in Minnesota with her spouse and daughter. Today, we’ll talk about her memoir: Beard: A Memoir of a Marriage.
Learn more at kellyfosterlundquist.com
Special thanks to Net Galley for advance copies.
For information about the nonprofit receiving a portion of the profits made off Beard, visit: pfundfoundation.org
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Heather Gudenkauf is the Edgar Award nominated, New York Times & USA Today bestselling author of ten novels, including The Overnight Guest and her most recent thriller Everyone is Watching. Her debut novel, The Weight of Silence, was an instant NYT bestseller and remained on the list for 22 weeks. Gudenkauf’s critically acclaimed novels have been published in over 25 countries and have sold over 2.5 million copies worldwide. Her books have been featured on many Best Of roundups including lists by The New York Times, The Washington Post, NPR, Amazon, Apple Books, GoodReads, and more. Heather was born in Wagner, South Dakota, the youngest of six children. At one month of age, her family returned to the Rosebud Indian Reservation in South Dakota where her father was employed as a guidance counselor and her mother as a school nurse. Heather lives in Iowa with her family and a very spoiled German Shorthaired Pointer named Lolo. In her free time, Heather enjoys spending time with her family, reading, swimming, and hiking. Her latest novel is The Perfect Hosts.
Learn more at heathergudenkauf.com
Killer Author Club: killerauthorclub.com
Iowa Writer's House: Iowawritershouse.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for an early preview copy.
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Author of Chocolat, the best-selling novel that became the acclaimed movie starring Juliette Binoche, Dame Judi Dench, and Johnny Depp, Joanne Harris weighs in on her latest novel, Vianne and what it's taken to maintain her successful writing career.
Joanne Harris is the internationally renowned and award-winning author of more than twenty novels, plus novellas, cookbooks, scripts, short stories, libretti, lyrics, articles, and a self-help book for writers. Her books are published in fifty countries. She holds honorary doctorates from the Universities of Sheffield and Huddersfield, is an honorary Fellow of St. Catharine's College, Cambridge, and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. Joanne was born in South Yorkshire, England, of a French mother and an English father, and lives with her husband in Yorkshire. She is the author of the acclaimed novel, Chocolat, which became a movie starring Juliette Binoche and Johnny Depp. Today, we’ll discuss the prequel, Vianne.
“Is chocolate magic? Whether you savored the 1999 bestseller or the 2000 movie, this sensuous prequel to Chocolat will make you a believer.” —People Magazine, Best New Books
Special thanks to NetGalley for an early preview copy.
Learn more at www.joanne-harris.co.uk
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Olivia Dade sheds light on the jobs predating her writing career and why maintaining voice is important to an author's success.
Dade grew up an undeniable nerd, prone to ignoring the world around her as she read any book she could find. Her favorites, though, were always, always romances. As an adult, she earned an M.A. in American history and worked in a variety of jobs that required the donning of actual pants: Colonial Williamsburg interpreter, high school teacher, academic tutor, and (of course librarian. Now, however, she has finally achieved her lifelong goal of wearing pajamas all day as a hermit-like writer and enthusiastic hag. She currently lives outside Stockholm with her delightful family and their ever-burgeoning collection of books. Her latest novel is Second Chance Romance.
Learn more at oliviadade.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for early review copies.
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Elizabeth Bass Parnam queried over two-hundred times before landing an agent and finding her novel in a four-way bidding war. Not giving up landed her where she'd always wanted to be: living the life of a professional novelist. This episode, Elizabeth shares her journey and discusses her newest novel, Bees in June.
Elizabeth is a native Nashvillian, who had the extraordinarily good fortune of having as an English teacher in middle school author Lee Smith. Lee told Elizabeth to always keep writing, which she has joyfully done. She received her Bachelor’s degree in English literature from Hamilton College in upstate New York after spending a glorious Junior year in Canterbury, England, attending the University of Kent. She visited a dozen countries during her time there, much to the detriment of her GPA. As an Anglophile, one of the highlights of her travels was finding herself in a tiny museum in Wales, alone with Princess Diana’s wedding dress. After a year working in Manhattan, she returned to Nashville and married her high school sweetheart. They have now-grown identical twin daughters. She holds a Master’s degree in education from Belmont University in Nashville, and recently retired from a non-profit, working with children and adults with reading-based learning disabilities such as dyslexia. Elizabeth is a member of the Women's Fiction Writers Association and the Nashville Writers Alliance. Her latest novel is THE BEES IN JUNE.
Learn more at elizabethbassparnam.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for a preview of The Bees in June.
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Writing can be a struggle between joy and pain, but Jennifer Probst seems to have figured out how to pivot during the less enjoyable times.
Jennifer is the New York Times, USA Today, and Wall Street Journal bestselling author of over fifty books in contemporary romance fiction. Her work has been translated in over a dozen countries, sold over 2 million copies, and was dubbed a "romance phenom" by Kirkus Reviews. Her passions include reading, horse racing, Scrabble, Italian wine and food, shameful reality television, and rescue dogs. Like some of her characters, Probst, along with her husband and two sons, calls New York’s Hudson Valley home. She released THE RELUCTANT FLIRT this summer and will release COVET in September.
Learn more at Jenniferprobst.com
Jennifer's Write Naked Programming can be found here.
Special thanks to Net Galley for early previews.
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Poppy and Kris have an honest conversation about writing with neurodivergence and other health issues, and Poppy gives the background of her latest novel, Battle of the Bookshops.
Poppy Alexander is the author of The Littlest Library, Storybook Ending, and 25 Days ’Til Christmas. She wrote her first book when she was five. There was a long gap in her writing career while she was at school, and after studying classical music at university, she decided the world of music was better off without her and took up public relations, campaigning, political lobbying, and a bit of journalism instead. She takes an anthropological interest in family, friends, and life in her West Sussex village (think The Archers crossed with Twin Peaks), where she lives with her husband, children, and various other pets. Her latest novel is Battle of the Bookshops.
Learn more at PoppyAlexander.com
Special thanks to Net Galley.
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Hannah McKinnon enjoyed success writing for young people. Then, pulled back when asked to write edgier novels, recalibrating and finding success in the adult market.
Hannah is the author of several acclaimed novels, including The Lake Season, Mystic Summer, The Summer House, Sailing Lessons, The View from Here, Message in the Sand, The Darlings, The Summer Club, and her latest, The Sandy Page Bookshop. She graduated from Connecticut College and the University of South Australia. She lives in Connecticut, with her family, a flock of chickens, and two raggedy rescue dogs.
Learn more at HannahMcKinnon.com
Special thanks to Net Galley for providing advanced copies.
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Courtney Psak graduated with a degree in Communications and Journalism with a master’s degree in Publishing. She currently lives in Palm Beach, Florida with her husband and two sons. She is a member of the Women’s Fiction Writers Association, the National Writers Association, International Thriller Writers and a board member for the Mystery Writers of America. Her newest novel is The Tutor.
Special thanks to Net Galley for an early copy.
Learn more at courtneypsak.com
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Jane Hamilton shares what she's been doing since publishing her last novel almost ten years ago and reveals what got in her way while writing The Phoebe Variations.
Jane Hamilton is the author of seven critically acclaimed and bestselling novels, including The Book of Ruth and A Map of the World, both of which were Oprah's Book Club selections. Her nonfiction has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Allure, Elle, and various anthologies. She's married to an apple farmer and lives in Wisconsin.
Learn more at Janehamiltonbooks.com
Special thanks to Net Galley for an advance copy of The Phoebe Variations.
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Shirley Russak Wachtel is the author of the short story collection Three For A Dollar, the book of poetry, In The Mellow Light, and several books for children. Her short stories and poems have appeared in various literary journals. A daughter of Holocaust survivors, Wachtel was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York. She holds a doctor of letters degree from Drew University and Professor Emerita of English at Middlesex College in New Jersey. The mother of three grown sons and grandmother to three precocious granddaughters, she currently resides in East Brunswick, New Jersey, with her husband, Arthur.
Learn more at ShirleyWachtel.com
Special thanks to Net Galley for advance reader copies.
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What does it take to become a successful multi-genre author? J.T. Ellison reveals how she's navigated the changing publishing market while maintaining an authentic writing voice and promotional image.
JT is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of more than 35+ novels, and the EMMY® award winning co-host of the literary TV show A WORD ON WORDS. She also writes urban fantasy under the pen name Joss Walker. With millions of books in print, her work has won critical acclaim, prestigious awards, been optioned for television, and has been published in 28 countries. J.T. lives in Nashville with her husband and twin kittens, where she is hard at work on her next novel. Today, we’re going to talk about her latest, LAST SEEN.
Learn more at JTEllison.com
Special thanks to Net Galley for an advance copy of Last Seen.
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Amran Gowani is a former Wall Street analyst, a prolific content creator and over the last four years he's written and produced 200 humorous personal essays and satirical short-form pieces. When Amran’s not hanging out with imaginary people in imaginary places, he enjoys biking around the great city of Chicago, bouldering with his extraordinary wife Felicia, and reading comic books with his two wildly imaginative and deeply ungrateful children. By leveraging his lifelong love of film, literature, and video games—and drawing upon his decade-plus of surreal and disturbing experiences across Big Pharma and Wall Street—he crafted his blistering debut novel Leverage, which we’ll discuss on this episode of the Writing Table.
Special thanks to Net Galley.
Learn more at amrangowani.com
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Ally Carter's novels are infused with excitement and Mr. and Mrs. Smith level romantic intrigue. Crafting them is not as easy as some might assume. Ally peels back the curtain and shares unvarnished accountings of the heartache that comes with creating electric jaunts for her characters.
Ally is the bestselling author of novels that have epitomized action-adventure YA romance for more than a decade. From the spy-centric humor of I’d Tell You I Love You, but Then I’d Have to Kill You to the globe-trotting glamour of Heist Society, Embassy Row, and Not If I Save You First, the name Ally Carter is synonymous with hilarious action and heart-pounding romance. She is also the author of The Winterborne Home for Vengeance and Valor and The Winterborne Home for Mayhem and Mystery for younger readers. Her first original screenplay, A Castle for Christmas, was recently #1 on Netflix. Ally lives within an easy drive of her home farm in Oklahoma and encourages you to follow her online if you love bad pictures and typo-filled tweets that she sends out when she really should be writing. Today, we’ll chat about her latest, THE BLONDE WHO CAME IN FROM THE COLD.
Learn more at allycarter.com
Special thanks to Net Galley for a preview of Ally's latest novel.
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HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN is USA Today bestselling author of 16 psychological thrillers, winning the most prestigious awards in the genre: five Agathas, five Anthonys, and the coveted Mary Higgins Clark Award. She is also on-air investigative reporter for Boston’s WHDH-TV, with 37 EMMYs and dozens more journalism honors for her groundbreaking journalism and true crime stories. National book critics call her “a superb and gifted storyteller.” Her current novel isOne Wrong Word, a twisty story of gaslighting, manipulation, and murder. Hank is on the board of International Thriller Writers, a sought-after teacher and keynote speaker, and host of three popular online live events: THE BACK ROOM, CRIME TIME on A Mighty Blaze, and FIRST CHAPTER FUN. She lives in Boston with her husband, a nationally renowned criminal defense attorney. Her next novel, All This Could be Yours, comes out in September from Minotaur Books. People Magazine says: “A nail-biting thriller.”
Learn more at hankphillippiryan.com
Special thanks to Net Galley for providing advance copies.
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Joelle Babula writes about things your mother warned you not to talk about at the dinner table, like infidelity, emotional chaos and cheese-induced bliss. A former award-winning journalist and columnist turned nurse practitioner, Joelle now lives on Baltimore’s inner harbor with her adoring husband and two absurd cats. A graduate of Johns Hopkins University School of Nursing, she spends her days caring for patients and her nights stirring up fictional drama, often with a glass of wine in hand and a wedge of something smelly on her plate. Infidelity Rules is her debut novel. And yes, she’s working on the next one (probably while avoiding her inbox and roasting a chicken). When not writing or helping patients, she’s exploring Charm City’s restaurant scene, throwing impromptu dinner parties or crisscrossing the East Coast in search of her next great food-moan. She and her husband love traveling, biking and dancing like nobody’s watching—even though someone usually is. Her debut novel is INFIDELITY RULES.
Learn more at joellebabula.com
Special thanks to Net Galley for providing advance copies.
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David Wroblewski is the author, most recently, of the novel Familiaris, his follow up to the internationally bestselling The Story Of Edgar Sawtelle, an Oprah Book Club pick, Barnes and Noble Discover Great New Writers selection, winner of the Colorado Book Award, Indie Choice Best Author Discovery award, and Midwest Bookseller Association's Choice award, in addition to being selected as one of the best books of the year by numerous magazines and newspapers. David received an M.F.A. in Creative Writing from the Warren Wilson M.F.A. Program for Writers, and a Bachelor’s degree in computer science from the University of Wisconsin. He lives in Colorado with the writer Kimberly McClintock and their dogs, Pie and Luci.
Learn more at davidwroblewski.com
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Juliette Fay returns to the Writing Table; this time to discuss writing historical fiction and the work she's done to create The Harvey Girls.
Fay is the bestselling author of eight novels. THE TUMBLING TURNER SISTERS was a USA Today bestseller and Costco Pennie’s Book Club Pick. THE SHORTEST WAY HOME was chosen as one of Library Journal’s Top 5 Best Books of 2012: Women’s Fiction; DEEP DOWN TRUE was short-listed for the 2011Women’s Fiction award by the American Library Association; and SHELTER ME, received a 2009 Massachusetts Book Award “Must-Read Book” and chosen as an Indie Next pick.
Juliette is a graduate of Boston College and Harvard University, and lives in Massachusetts with her family. Her latest novel is THE HARVEY GIRLS.
Learn more at juliettefay.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for providing advance copies.
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Bestselling author Karin Slaughter shares how she got her start, explores her writing process, and gives listeners a look at what's coming next.
Karin Slaughter is the author of more than twenty instant New York Times bestselling novels, including the Edgar–nominated Cop Townand standalone novels Pretty Girls, The Good Daughter, and Pieces of Her. She is published in 120 countries with more than 40 million copies sold across the globe. Pieces of Heris a #1 Netflix original series starring Toni Collette, and WILL TRENT, based on her Will Trent series, is on ABC (and streaming on Hulu in the U.S. and Disney+ internationally). False Witness and The Good Daughter are in development for television. Slaughter is the founder of the Save the Libraries project—a nonprofit organization established to support libraries and library programming. A native of Georgia, she lives in Atlanta. Her latest novel is WE ARE ALL GUILTY HERE.
Learn more at Karinslaughter.com.
Special thanks to NetGalley for providing advance copies.
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Laura Wood peels back the emotions behind her writing and provides a preview of her novel, Let's Make A Scene.
Wood is a bestselling and acclaimed author of children’s and young adult novels. She is also the author of the adult novels Under Your Spell and Let’s Make a Scene. With a PhD in 19th-century literature, Laura lives in Warwickshire, England, with her husband, and their dog, Bea.
Visit LauraClareWood.com and follow her on Instagram @LauraCWood and on X @LauraClareWood.
Special thanks to NetGalley for providing advance copies.
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Anna Barrington has worked in galleries, museums, and auction houses in the art world for seven years. She received an MA from the Courtauld Institute of Art in London and a BA from the University of St. Andrews in Scotland. Originally from Atlanta, she grew up on Cape Cod and currently lives in the UK. THE SPECTACLE is her first novel.
Learn more at annabarrington.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for providing advance copies.
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Simon Tolkien is the grandson of JRR Tolkien and a director of the Tolkien Estate. He is also series consultant for the Amazon series, The Rings of Power. He studied Modern History at Trinity College, Oxford and went on to become a London barrister specializing in criminal defense. He left the law to become a writer in 2001 and has published five novels which mine the history of the first half of the last century to explore dark subjects – capital punishment, the Holocaust, the London Blitz and the Battle of the Somme. The epic coming-of-age story of Theo Sterling, set in 1930s New York, England and Spain, is being published in two volumes this year: The Palace at the End of the Sea and The Room of Lost Steps.
Learn more at Simontolkien.com
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What inspires an established writer to change genres? In this episode, Laura Resau discusses what it took to create her adult debut, The Alchemy of Flowers.
Laura Resau is the author of eleven acclaimed books for young people. Her books have won five Colorado Book Awards and spots on “best-of” booklists from Oprah, the American Library Association, and more. Trilingual, she’s lived in Provence and Oaxaca, and studied cultural anthropology and languages. She teaches graduate creative writing at Western Colorado University. You might find her writing in her cozy vintage trailer in Fort Collins, Colorado, where she lives with her rock-hound husband, musician son, wild husky, and a hundred house plants. Her latest novel is THE ALCHEMY OF FLOWERS.
Learn more at LauraResau.com
Special thanks to Net Galley for providing advance copies.
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Daniel Kalla is an Emergency Room Physician and the bestselling author of fifteen novels, translated into eleven languages. His Shanghai Trilogy has been optioned for film, and his works explore themes ranging from superbugs and pandemics to psychedelics and DNA evidence. In addition to psychological thrillers and medical suspense, Daniel has written three historical novels about the 20,000 German Jews who found refuge in WWII-era Shanghai. A frequent media contributor, Daniel has appeared on ABC, NBC, CNN, CBC, and Entertainment Weekly. He earned his MD from the University of British Columbia, where he is now a clinical professor. A Vancouver native, he’s the proud father of two daughters and the devoted owner of two mischievous mutts, Milo and Lulu. His latest novel, The Deepest Fake, follows a tech CEO whose life unravels amid deepfakes, deception, and a potentially fatal diagnosis.
Learn more at DanielKalla.com
Special thanks to Net Galley for providing advance copies.
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Lori Roy is the author of six novels of suspense. Lori's debut, BENT ROAD, was awarded the Edgar Allen Poe Award for Best First Novel by an American Author. She went on to receive the 2016 Edgar Allen Poe Award for Best Novel, making Lori the first woman to receive an Edgar Award for both Best First Novel and Best Novel, and she is the third person to have done so.
Lori's critically acclaimed work has been named a New York Times Editors' Choice, twice named a New York Times Notable Crime Book, featured in People Magazine as Book of the Week and excerpted in Oprah Magazine. Her work has been widely reviewed and has been included on numerous Best Of lists and summer reading lists. Lori lives with her family in west-central Florida. Her latest novel is THE FINAL EPISODE.
Learn more at: LoriRoy.com
Special thanks to Net Galley for advance previews.
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Alden Jones explores tips for writing memoirs and discusses her work in fiction. She is the author of The Wanting Was a Wilderness, Unaccompanied Minors, and The Blind Masseuse. Her books have won awards including the New American Fiction Prize and the Lascaux Book Prize and been finalists for the PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay, the Edmund White Award for Debut Fiction, and two Lambda Literary Awards. Short works of fiction and nonfiction have appeared in The Best American Travel Writing, The Cut, the Boston Globe, Agni, Prairie Schooner, the Iowa Review, Post Road, and The Rumpus. Alden holds degrees in literature and creative writing from Brown University, New York University, and Bennington College. She is Writer-in-Residence at Emerson College.
Her latest work is Edge of the World: An Anthology of Queer Travel Writing.
Learn more at alden-jones.com
Special thanks to Net Galley for providing advance copies.
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Bestselling author Susan Wiggs discusses her writing practices and shares the backstory surrounding her passion project, Wayward Girls.
Susan Wiggs’s life is all about family, friends…and fiction. She lives at the water’s edge on an island in Puget Sound, and in good weather, she commutes to her writers’ group in a 21-foot motorboat. She’s been featured in the national media, including NPR, PRI, and USA Today, has given programs for the US Embassies in Buenos Aires and Montevideo, and is a popular speaker locally, nationally, internationally, and on the high seas. From the very start, her writings have illuminated the everyday dramas of ordinary people facing extraordinary circumstances. Her books celebrate the power of love, the timeless bonds of family and the fascinating nuances of human nature. Today, she is an international best-selling, award-winning author, with millions of copies of her books in print in numerous countries and languages. According to Publishers Weekly, Wiggs writes with “refreshingly honest emotion,” and the Salem Statesman Journal adds that she is “one of our best observers of stories of the heart [who] knows how to capture emotion on virtually every page of every book.” Booklist characterizes her books as “real and true and unforgettable.” Susan is a former teacher, a Harvard graduate, an avid hiker, an amateur photographer, a good skier and terrible golfer, yet her favorite form of exercise is curling up with a good book. She lives on an island in Puget Sound, where she divides her time between sleeping and waking. Her latest novel is Wayward Girls.
Learn more at SusanWiggs.com
Special thanks to Net Galley for an advance review copy.
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Following over two hundred interviews, journalist Megan Greenwell's book, Bad Company, shines light onto the lives of those living and working downstream from private equity decision makers.
Megan Greenwell is a journalist with extensive experience in all areas of print and digital media. She volunteers as the deputy director of the Princeton Summer Journalism Program, a workshop and college access initiative for first-generation and low-income high school students. In her most recent full-time job, Megan worked as the editor of Wired.com and, for four months, the interim editor-in-chief of WIRED, overseeing the publication’s transition to a global newsroom. In previous roles, she served as editor-in-chief of Deadspin, launched digital features programs at Esquire and New York magazine's The Cut, edited investigations and narrative features for ESPN the Magazine, and covered the war in Iraq from Baghdad for The Washington Post. She has also written features and essays for The New York Times, The Washington Post Magazine, The California Sunday Magazine, Slate, and several other publications. She has done two tours as an advice columnist on workplace issues, for The New York Times and WIRED. Stories Megan has edited have been nominated for two National Magazine Awards and a GLAAD Media Award, and she was part of the Washington Post team that won the 2008 Pulitzer Prize for breaking news reporting for its coverage of the Virginia Tech shootings. She has taught journalism at Syracuse University's Newhouse School of Public Communications and serves as chair of the board of trustees of the Columbia Daily Spectator. A California native, she lives in New York with her husband, a physician and scholar of global health, and their pug Theo.
Learn more at megangreenwell.com
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Jaclyn Goldish peels back the curtain on her process and lessons learned as she's published four novels.
Jaclyn is a graduate of the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, and NYU School of Law. She practiced estate planning law at a large Chicago firm for seven years before leaving her job to travel the world and write novels. After culling her possessions into only what would fit in a backpack, she traveled for over a year until settling in Tel Aviv, where she can often be found writing from cafés near the beach. She is the author of The Chateau, The Main Character, and The Safari.
Learn more at jaclyngoldis.com.
Special thanks to Net Galley for an advance review copy.
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New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Jill Shalvis writes contemporary romance and romantic comedies filled with madcap adventures and shenanigans and sexy times. (just don’t tell her mom). She’s sold 20 million plus copies worldwide to date and lives with her family in a small mountain town near Lake Tahoe full of quirky characters (Any resemblance to the quirky characters in her books is mostly coincidental). Jill’s latest novel is Better Than Friends.
For more information visit www.jillshalvis.com
Many thanks to NetGalley for providing an advance copy of this novel.
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How does a Pulitzer Prize winning author find inspiration? Sue Halpern shares tips and discusses writing both nonfiction and fiction.
Sue is the author of seven previous books of fiction and nonfiction, most recently the novel Summer Hours at the Robbers Library. Her writing has appeared in The New Yorker, the New York Times Magazine, the New York Review of Books, Rolling Stone, and Condé Nast Traveler, and she has appeared on NPR’s All Things Considered and The Today Show. A beloved college professor, and a former New Yorker staff writer, she lives in Vermont with her husband, the writer and environmental activist Bill McKibben, and is a scholar-in-residence at Middlebury College.
Learn more at suehalpern.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for providing advanced review copies to The Writing Table.
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Jackie Lau decided she wanted to be a writer when she was in grade two, sometime between penning “The Heart That Got Lost” and “The Land of Shapes.” She later studied engineering and worked as a geophysicist before turning to writing romance novels. She is now the author of over twenty books.
Jackie lives in Toronto with her husband, and despite living in Canada her whole life, she hates winter. When she’s not writing, she enjoys gelato, gourmet donuts, cooking, hiking, and reading on the balcony when it’s raining. Today, she’ll tell us about turning those science lessons into romantic stories like her latest, TIME LOOPS & MEET CUTES.
Learn more at Jackielaubooks.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for a preview copy.
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Jillian Forsberg is a business owner and historical fiction author. She writes about animals from the past in her two books, The Rhino Keeper and forthcoming The Porcelain Menagerie. She lives and works in Wichita, Kansas.
Special thanks to Net Galley for an advance copy.
Learn more at jillianforsberg.com.
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As Amy Poeppel publishes her fifth novel, she reflects on lessons learned and discusses the challenges she faced while writing a novel simultaneously set in Berlin and Dallas.
Amy Poeppel grew up in Dallas, Texas. She graduated from Wellesley College and worked as an actress in the Boston area, appearing in a corporate industrial for Polaroid, a commercial for Brooks Pharmacy, and a truly terrible episode of America’s Most Wanted, along with other TV spots and several plays. While in Boston, she also got her M.A. in Teaching from Simmons College. She is married to David Poeppel, a neuroscientist at NYU and a Max Planck director in Frankfurt. For the past thirty years, they have lived in many cities, including San Francisco, Berlin, and New York, and had three sons along the way. Amy taught high school English in the Washington, DC suburbs, and after moving to New York, she worked as an assistant director of admissions at an independent school where she had the fulfilling experience of meeting and getting to know hundreds of applicant families. She attended sessions at the Actors Studio and wrote the theatrical version of Small Admissions, which was performed there as a staged reading in 2011. Amy’s writing has also appeared in The New York Times, The Rumpus, LitHub, Working Mother, Points In Case, and The Belladonna.
Learn more at AmyPoeppel.com
Special thanks to Net Galley for preview copies.
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Laura Lippman discusses how poetry feeds her spirit and looks back on her longstanding run with indelible character, Tess Monaghan, who has appeared in a dozen novels. While sharing her writing experiences, she invites listeners to take a seat on her (theoretical) analyst's couch to uncover snags interfering with meaningful storytelling.
Laura was a reporter for twenty years, including 12 years at The (Baltimore) Sun. She began writing novels while working fulltime and published seven books about “accidental PI” Tess Monaghan before leaving daily journalism in 2025. Her work has been awarded the Edgar ®, the Anthony, the Agatha, the Shamus, the Nero Wolfe, Gumshoe and Barry awards. She also has been nominated for other prizes in the crime fiction field, including the Hammett and the Macavity. She was the first-ever recipient of the Mayor’s Prize for Literary Excellence and the first genre writer recognized as Author of the Year by the Maryland Library Association. She grew up in Baltimore and attended city schools through ninth grade. After graduating from Wilde Lake High School in Columbia, Md., and attended Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism. Her other newspaper jobs included the Waco Tribune-Herald and the San Antonio Light. She returned to Baltimore in 1989 and has lived there since. She is the daughter of Theo Lippman Jr., a Sun editorial writer who retired in 1995 but continues to freelance for several newspapers, and Madeline Mabry Lippman, a former Baltimore City school librarian. Her sister, Susan, is a local bookseller. Her newest novel is MURDER TAKES A VACATION.
Learn more at Lauralippman.com
Special thanks to Net Galley for an advance review copy.
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With the publication of Tularosa in 1996, Michael McGarrity turned to writing full time. Many of his novels have been national best sellers. He holds a BA with distinction in psychology and a master’s degree in clinical social work. As an undergraduate, he held a Ford Foundation Scholarship at the University of New Mexico. He is an honor graduate of the New Mexico Law Enforcement Academy. His career in criminal justice spanned over twenty-five years and included creating treatment programs for drug offenders, supervising outreach services for at-risk juveniles, and re-establishing mental health services for the Department of Corrections after the infamous 1980 riot at the New Mexico Penitentiary. As a Santa Fe County deputy sheriff, he worked as a patrol officer, training and planning supervisor, community relations officer, and was the lead investigator of the sex crimes unit, which he established. Additionally, he taught courses at the New Mexico Law Enforcement Academy, served as a caseworker and investigator for the Public Defender’s District Office, and conducted investigations for a state government agency. In 1980 he was named New Mexico Social Worker of the Year and in 1987 was recognized by the American Legion as Police Officer of the Year. In 2004 he received the New Mexico Governor’s Award for Excellence in the Arts — Literature. He is also the 2015 recipient of the Frank Waters Exemplary Literary Achievement Award and the 2015 Santa Fe Mayor’s Award for Excellence in the Arts – Literature. He has been instrumental in establishing the Hillerman-McGarrity Creative Writing Scholarship at the University of New Mexico, the Richard Bradford Memorial Creative Writing Scholarship at the Santa Fe Community College, and the N. Scott Momaday Creative Writing Scholarship at the Institute of American Indian Arts. He lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico with his wife Emily Beth (Mimi). His latest novel is Night in the City.
Learn more at Michaelmcgarrity.com
Special thanks to Net Galley for advance review copies.
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Aimee Phan was born and raised in Orange County, California. She received her BA in English from UCLA and her MFA from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. She is the author of two books for adults, We Should Never Meet: Stories and the novel The Reeducation of Cherry Truong. She has received fellowships and residencies from the NEA, MacDowell Colony, the Rockefeller Foundation’s Bellagio Center, Djerassi and Hedgebrook. Her writing has appeared in The New York Times, Time, USA Today and CNN.com among other publications. Aimee teaches as an associate professor in writing and literature at the California College of the Arts in San Francisco and resides in Berkeley, California with her family.
Learn more at aimeephan.com
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Lindy Ryan discusses writing horror as a novelist and anthologist. She is an award-winning author, anthologist, and short-film director whose books and anthologies have received starred reviews from Publishers Weekly, Booklist and Library Journal. Several of her projects have been adapted for screen. Ryan is the current author-in-residence at Rue Morgue. Declared a “champion for women’s voices in horror” by Shelf Awareness, Ryan was named a Publishers Weekly Star Watch Honoree in 2020, and in 2022, was named one of horror's most masterful anthology curators. Born and raised in Southeast Texas, Ryan currently resides on the East Coast. She is a professor at Rutgers University.Her latest novel is Another Fine Mess.
Learn more at LindyRyanWrites.com
Thanks to NetGalley for an advance copy.
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Kaira Rouda talks about writing thrillers and how she came to host the Killer Author Club with her author friends.
Kaira is an award–winning, USA Today and Amazon Charts bestselling author of contemporary fiction that explores what goes on beneath the surface of seemingly perfect lives. Her novels of domestic suspense include The Widow, Somebody’s Home, The Next Wife, The Favorite Daughter, Best Day Ever, All the Difference and more. Beneath the Surface has been optioned for a feature film. To date, Kaira’s work has been translated into more than a dozen languages. Three of her novels have been named Amazon Editor’s Picks for Best Mystery, Thriller & Suspense. The Next Wife was named a Suspense Magazine’s Best Book of 2021 Award, and a 2022 Silver Falchion for Best Suspense Novel and a 2022 Silver Falchion first runner-up for Best Book of the Year. She lives in Southern California with her family and is working on her next novel.
Learn more at Kairarouda.com
Special thanks to Net Galley for an advance review copy.
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RayAnne Thayne's novels showcase complicated family dynamics and always deliver swoony love stories, but how does she keep up the magic after eighty books? Tune in, and find out.
New York Times, USA Today, Wall Street Journal and #1 Publishers Weekly bestselling author RaeAnne Thayne has written more than 70 books since selling her first book in 1995. She has received a career achievement award from Romantic Times for series romantic adventure, as well as a Pioneer of Romance award. She finds inspiration from the beautiful mountains of northern Utah, where she lives with her family.
Learn more at rayannethayne.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for early preview copies.
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Sue Hincenbergs discusses querying 198 agents and the successful query letter that she shares with other writers. Sue is a former television producer who has worked on multiple award-winning programs. She lives in Toronto with her (very much alive) husband, her scruffy, middle-aged rescue dog, Kramer, and the rooms full of the stuff her three sons left behind when they moved out. The porch light is always on in case one comes by for a visit. The Retirement Plan is her first novel.
Learn more at Suehincenbergs.com
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Matt Goldman has written for television shows like Seinfeld but found his calling writing crime novels. He is a New York Times Bestselling author and Emmy Award winning television writer. He has been nominated for the Shamus Award and Nero Award. Matt's television writing credits include Seinfeld, Ellen, The New Adventures of Old Christine, and Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency. Matt lives in Minneapolis with his wife, two dogs, and two cats.
Learn more at: MattGoldman.com
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Jacqueline Friedland unpacks her process and discusses why she chooses societally relevant challenges for her characters.
Jacqueline graduated Magna Cum Laude from both the University of Pennsylvania and NYU Law School. She practiced as a commercial litigator for New York law firms before determining that office life did not suit her. Jacqueline began teaching Legal Writing and Lawyering Skills at the Benjamin Cardozo School of Law in Manhattan and working on her first book in her limited spare time. Finally deciding to embrace her passion and pursue writing full time, Jacqueline returned to school and earned her MFA from Sarah Lawrence College. When not writing, Jacqueline is an avid reader of all things fiction. She loves to exercise, watch movies with her family, listen to music, make lists, and dream about exotic vacations. She lives in Westchester, New York with her husband, four children and two very bossy canines. Her latest novel is Counting Backwards.
Learn more at jacquelinefriedland.com
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Dane Huckelbridge discusses the settings in his novels and his research--from Africa for No Beast So Fierce to the plains of Oklahoma for his latest, Queen of All Mayhem--the tale of the most dangerous woman of the American west, Belle Starr.
Dane was born and raised in the American Middle West. He holds a degree from Princeton University, and his fiction and essays have appeared in a variety of journals, including Tin House, Literary Hub, The Wall Street Journal, Time Magazine, and The New Republic. His debut novel CASTLE OF WATER was published by St. Martin's Press in 2017, and his book NO BEAST SO FIERCE was published by HarperCollins in 2019. He currently lives in Paris, France, although he goes back to New York whenever he can.
Learn more at Danehuckelbridge.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for advancing early copies of novels to the Writing Table.
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Lauren Willig discusses co-writing and writing cross-genre plus gives us the scoop on her latest novel. Lauren is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of more than twenty-five works of historical fiction, including Band of Sisters, The Summer Country, The English Wife, the RITA Award-winning Pink Carnation series, and five novels co-written with Beatriz Williams and Karen White. Her books have been translated into over twenty languages, picked for Book of the Month Club, awarded the RITA, Booksellers Best, and Golden Leaf awards, and chosen for the American Library Association’s annual list of the best genre fiction. An alumna of Yale University, she has a graduate degree in history from Harvard and a JD from Harvard Law School. She lives in New York City with her husband, two young children, and vast quantities of coffee. Her latest novel is The Girl from Greenwich Street.
Learn more at https://laurenwillig.com
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How does an author balance a writing career that spans television and literature? Melissa de la Cruz discusses how she makes it all work. Melissa de la Cruz is the #1 New York Times, #1 Publishers Weekly, and #1 IndieBound bestselling author of many critically acclaimed and award-winning novels for readers of all ages. Many of her more than seventy books have also topped USA Today, Wall Street Journal, and Los Angeles Times bestseller lists and have been published in over twenty countries. She lives in West Hollywood with her husband and daughter.
Learn more at: www.melissa-delacruz.com.
Special thanks to Netgalley for an advance copy of When Stars Align.
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What makes a fascinating female protagonist? Wall Street Journal bestselling author Victoria Helen Stone shares how she creates her characters, where she goes for inspiration, and what she learned about conspiracy theories in this episode. Victoria is the author of the runaway hit Jane Doe, writes critically acclaimed novels of dark intrigue and emotional suspense. Her work includes Follow Her Down, At the Quiet Edge, The Last One Home, Problem Child, Half Past, The Hook, and the chart-toppers False Step and Evelyn, After.
Victoria writes in her home office high in the Wasatch Mountains of Utah, far from her origins in the flattest plains of Minnesota, Texas, and Oklahoma. She enjoys gorgeous summer trail hikes in the mountains almost as much as she enjoys staying inside by the fire during winter. Victoria is passionate about dessert, true crime, and her terror of mosquitoes, which have targeted her in a diabolical conspiracy to hunt her down no matter the season. Her latest novel is BALD FACED LIAR.
Learn more at VictoriaHelenStone.com.
Special thanks to Netgalley for an advanced copy of Bald Faced Liar.
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Paulette Kennedy explores the world of gothic suspense, peeling back the curtain on her writing journey and process. She is the bestselling author of The Witch of Tin Mountain, The Devil and Mrs. Davenport, and Parting the Veil, which received the prestigious HNS Review Editor’s Choice Award. She has had a lifelong obsession with the gothic. As a young girl, she spent her summers among the gravestones in her neighborhood cemetery, imagining all sorts of romantic stories for the people buried there. After her mother introduced her to the Brontës as a teenager, her affinity for fog-covered landscapes and haunted heroines only grew, inspiring her to become a writer. Originally from the Missouri Ozarks, she now lives with her family and a menagerie of rescue pets in sunny Southern California, where sometimes, on the very best days, the mountains are wreathed in fog. Paulette’s latest novel is The Artist of Blackberry Grange.
Learn more at paulettekennedy.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for an advance copy of Paulette's novel.
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From book clubs to navigating characters who are hard to pin down, Marie Bostwick shares her best practices about drafting a novel and discusses what inspired her latest novel, The Bookclub for Troublesome Women.
Marie is a New York Times and USA Today Bestseller of heartwarming fiction for women. Published in 2005 by Kensington Books, Fields of Gold, her first novel, was a finalist for the prestigious Oklahoma Book Award. River’s Edge won the Golden Quill Award, was a finalist for a National Readers’ Choice Award, and an alternate selection of the Literary Guild. Her novellas appeared on the New York Times and USA Today bestseller lists, and her novels, The Second Sister and Between Heaven and Texas, were both USA Today bestsellers. A film adaptation of her book The Second Sister, “Christmas Everlasting,” debuted on the Hallmark Channel as a Hallmark Hall of Fame feature in November 2018, starring Patti LaBelle. Drawing on her lifelong love of quilting and themes of special relevance to modern women, Marie’s Cobbled Court Quilt series has gained a dedicated following among quilters as well as those who’ve never threaded a needle In 2014, Marie was recognized for Career Achievement in Mainstream Novels award by RT BOOK Reviews Magazine. Marie lives in Washington state with her husband, Brad. When not writing, she enjoys quilting, reading, cooking, and spending time with family and friends. Marie travels extensively, speaking at libraries, bookstores, quilt guilds, and at quilt shows.
Learn more at mariebostwick.com
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Catriona Silvey discusses her journey to publishing and what she's learned along the way. Catriona is the author of the international bestseller Meet Me in Another Life. She was born in Glasgow and grew up in Scotland and England. After collecting an unreasonable number of degrees from the universities of Cambridge, Chicago, and Edinburgh, she settled in Edinburgh where she lives with her husband and children. Her latest work is the time-travel romantic comedy Love and Other Paradoxes.
Learn more at CatrionaSilvey.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for an advance review copy.
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Emily Carpenter peels back the curtain on querying and how she arrived at her distinct style of southern gothic suspense. A former actor, producer, screenwriter, and behind-the-scenes soap opera assistant, Emily graduated with a Bachelor of Arts from Auburn University. Born and raised in Birmingham, Alabama, she now lives in Georgia with her family.
Learn more at: EmilyCarpenterAuthor.com.
Special thanks to Netgalley for the advance copy.
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Kat Mackenzie is an American who just happened to find herself living abroad for ten years and accidentally traveling to over forty countries in an attempt to taste all the food. She holds degrees from the University of Edinburgh and the University of Oxford but has discovered that they serve her best collecting dust on the shelf while she pens comedy-forward stories about women who travel. Work in Progress is her first novel.
Learn more at KatMackenzie.com.
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Raising sheep, chickens, and more while home schooling a house full of children, Melissa Ferguson shares what's in store for readers with her next novel, The Perfect Rom-Com. Melissa is the bestselling author of titles including Meet Me in the Margins, How to Plot a Payback, and On the Way to Christmas. She lives in Tennessee with her husband and children in their growing farmhouse lifestyle and writes heartwarming romantic comedies that have been featured in such places as The Hollywood Reporter, Travel + Leisure, Woman’s World, and BuzzFeed. Join along her journey with over 800,000 other followers at @ourfriendlyfarmhouse. Instagram: @ourfriendlyfarmhouse
TikTok: @ourfriendlyfarmhouse
Learn more at MelissaFerguson.com
Many thanks to NetGalley for providing an advance copy of this novel.
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Poppy Kuroki was born in Scotland and grew up in England. She’s been living in Japan in the Kanagawa prefecture since 2016 where she works as a writer and freelance editor, and lives with her son. She conducted extensive historical research while writing her debut, interviewing historians, tour guides, and even a descendent of Saigō Takamori. Gate to Kagoshima includes maps, family trees, character lists, timelines, and a glossary of terms for readers to immerse themselves fully in the period. The samurai setting is steeped in atmosphere and offers a fresh hook for readers looking for immersive stories featuring star-crossed lovers.
For more information follow Poppy on Instagram at @kurokibooks
Special thanks to NetGalley for an advanced copy.
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Years after completing an MFA at Iowa and retiring from a storied careers in television and academics, Bob Johnson returned to writing to become an award-winning short story writer and graduate of the lowa Writers’ Workshop. His work has been published by The Common, Philadelphia Stories, Vol. 1 Brooklyn, The Barcelona Review, and elsewhere. His story "The Continental Divide" was named Short Story of the Year in The Hudson Review. He lives in South Bend, Indiana.
For more information visit www.bobjohnsonwriter.com
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Jenn Bouchard reveals her takeaways on developing characters, how she rebounded after disappointment, and what's behind her latest novel, Considering Us.
Jenn has been teaching high school social studies for twenty-five years. She is an avid cook, volunteer for good causes, and devoted Red Sox fan. A graduate of Bates College and Tufts University, she lives in the Boston suburbs with her husband and two children. Enjoy FIRST COURSE in paperback, ebook, and audiobook.
For more information, visit jennbouchard.com
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What did Jennifer Weiner learn from Toni Morrison? Where did her research for her latest novel take her? Find out in this week's episode of the Writing Table.
Jennifer Weiner is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of nineteen books, including That Summer, Big Summer, Mrs. Everything, In Her Shoes, Good in Bed, and a memoir in essays, Hungry Heart. She has appeared on many national television programs, including the Today show and Good Morning America, and her work has been published in the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times, among other newspapers and magazines. Jennifer lives with her family in Philadelphia. Her latest novel is The Griffin Sisters’ Greatest Hits.
Learn more at: JenniferWeiner.com.
Many thanks to NetGalley for providing an advance copy of this novel.
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Cynthia Cina Pelayo is a Bram Stoker Award winning and International Latino Book Award winning author and poet. Heavily influenced by dark fairytales, folklore, urban legends and true crime and a master of blending gothic, horror, and suspense, Pelayo's latest is a dark retelling of Sleeping Beauty and explores what this classic tale reveals about death and the particular role of women in the fairytale. As a Chicago native, the city's dark history often plays a major role in her work and in her latest she explores haunted Archer Avenue and the Resurrection Mary legend, one of America's most famous vanishing hitchhikers. Her latest novel is Vanishing Daughters.
Learn more at Cinapelayo.com
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Kimberly Brock is the bestselling author of The Lost Book of Eleanor Dare, which was shortlisted for the prestigious Townsend Prize for Fiction, and The River Witch, recipient of the Georgia Author of the Year Award. She is the founder of Tinderbox Writers Workshop and has served as a guest lecturer for many regional and national writing workshops including at the Pat Conroy Literary Center. A native of North Georgia, she now lives near Atlanta. Her latest novel is The Fabled Earth.Learn more at kimberlybrockbooks.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for an advanced copy.
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Jacqueline Faber is an author and freelance writer. She holds a PhD in Comparative Literature from Emory University, where she was the recipient of a Woodruff Scholarship, and taught in the Expository Writing Program at New York University, where she received an award for excellence in teaching. She studied philosophy in Bologna, Italy, and received a dissertation grant from Freie University in Berlin, Germany. Jacqueline writes across genres, including thrillers, rom-coms, and essays. Her work explores questions about memory, loss, language, and desire. Steeped in philosophical, psychological, and literary themes, her writing is grounded in studies of character. As a freelancer, she writes for various companies, including a fair-trade marketplace for global artisans, where she helps bring their unique stories to life. She lives with her family in Los Angeles. Learn more at jacquelinefaber.com
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Dating is hard, but Lindsay Jill Roth has conducted years of research, revealing key topics to consider when looking for Mr. or Mrs. Right. Roth is an award-winning television and live-events producer who has created and developed a wide variety of programming globally, including original content for NBC, BET, ESPN, Food Network, Billboard, The Masters, The Grammys, The TONYs, and the US Open. She is the former producer of Emmy-nominated Larry King Now and the creator and executive producer of Haylie Duff’s Real Girl’s Kitchen. She is also the author of the novel What Pretty Girls Are Made Of. Lindsay lives in New York and London with her husband and two young sons. Her latest book is Romances and Practicalities.
Learn more at Lindsayjillroth.com
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Amber Chen is a Singaporean-Chinese author of SFF and contemporary fiction. She spends much of her free time living within Chinese fantasy novels and dramas, and also drinks one too many cups of bubble tea. One of her webnovels, The Cutting Edge, has been adapted for television. Today, we’ll chat about her latest novel, Of Jade and Dragons, a Goodreads Choice Award Nominee.
Learn more at ambercwrites.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for an advanced copy.
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Shanora Williams is a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of over thirty romance and diverse suspense novels. She lives near Charlotte, North Carolina with her husband and three boys and is a sister to eleven. When she isn’t writing, she’s spending time with her family, binge reading, or running marathons on TV streaming services. Her latest novel is Beautiful Broken Love.
Learn more at shanorawilliams.com
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1 Amazon Charts and Wall Street Journal bestselling author Barbara Nickless promised her mother she’d be a novelist when she grew up. What could be safer than sitting at a desk all day? But a sense of adventure led her astray for a few decades. Now an award-winning author and creative writing instructor, she spends her free time snowshoeing, caving and hiking the Colorado Rockies. Her latest novel is The Drowning Game.
Learn more at barbaranickless.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for an advanced copy.
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Zeeva Bukai was born in Israel and raised in New York City. Her stories have appeared in OfTheBook Press, Mcsweeney’s Quarterly Concern, December Magazine, The Jewish Quarterly and elsewhere. She completed a fellowship at the New York Center for Fiction, and residencies at Hedgebrook Writer’s Colony, and Byrdcliff AIR program. Zeeva received The Master’s Review fiction prize, the Curt Johnson Prose Award, and the Lilith Fiction Award. Her work has been anthologized in Frankly Feminist: Short Stories by Jewish Women from Lilith Magazine, and Out of Many: Multiplicity and Divisions in America Today. She holds an MFA from Brooklyn College and is the Assistant Director of Academic Support at SUNY Empire State University. She lives in Brooklyn with her family. Her debut novel is The Anatomy of Exile.
Learn more at zeevabukai.com
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Rosa Kwon Easton was born in Seoul, Korea, and grew up with her extended family in Los Angeles. Easton holds a bachelor’s degree in government from Smith College, a master’s in international and public affairs from Columbia University, and a JD from Boston College Law School. She is a lawyer and an elected trustee of the Palos Verdes Library District. She has two adult children and lives with her husband and Maltipoo in sunny Southern California. Her debut novel is White Mulberry.
Learn more at RosaKwonEaston.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for an advanced copy.
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Amelia Diane Coombs is the author of four young adult novels, most recently All Alone With You, a JLG Gold Standard Selection. She’s a Northern California transplant living in Seattle, Washington, with her spouse and their Siberian cat. Her first adult novel, Drop Dead Sisters, was recently published under Mindy Kaling's imprint.
Learn more at Ameliadianecoombs.com
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Murdle game books, available at your local indie bookstore and everywhere else, are created by G.T. Karber. G. T. grew up in a small town in Arkansas, the son of a judge and a civil rights attorney. He graduated summa cum laude from the University of Arkansas with a degree in mathematics and English literature. Then, he moved to Los Angeles, where he received a Master’s in Fine Arts from the University of Southern California’s School of Cinematic Arts. As the General Secretary of the Hollywood Mystery Society, a theater ensemble and cinematic social club, he has overseen the staging of more than 30 immersive whodunits in the LA area (a recent one of which was Murdle-related).
Learn more at gtkarber.com
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Darby Kane is a former divorce lawyer with a dual writing personality. Her debut thriller, Pretty Little Wife, was a Book of the Month pick, #1 international bestseller, and has been optioned by Amazon for a television series, starring Gabrielle Union. She’s written romantic suspense as HelenKay Dimon and currently writes stories centered on family hijinks with a mix of suspense and romance. The first, Moorewood Family Rules, has been optioned for television. Her latest novel is What the Wife Knew.Learn more at darbykane.com
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Rosie Schaap is the author of Drinking with Men: A Memoir and Becoming a Sommelier. She was a columnist for The New York Times Magazine, and has also contributed to the paper’s book review, dining, opinion, sports, and travel sections; This American Life; Food & Wine; Marie Claire; Saveur; Travel + Leisure; and many essay anthologies. She was previously employed as a community organizer and a manager of homeless shelters. A native New Yorker, she lives in Glenarm, Northern Ireland.
Learn more at: rosieschaap.net
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Pip Drysdale is an Australian author, musician and actor. She grew up in Africa, Canada, and Australia, became an adult in New York and London, and lives on a steady diet of coffee, dreams, and literature. All four of her books – The Sunday Girl, The Strangers We Know, The Paris Affair and The Next Girl – have been bestsellers in Australia. She lives in Sydney. Her latest book is The Close-Up.
Learn more at pipdrysdale.com
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Matthew FitzSimmons is the author of the Wall Street Journal bestselling Gibson Vaughn series, whiFitz includes Origami Man, Debris Line, Cold Harbor, Poisonfeather, and The Short Drop, and the Constance series. Born in Illinois and raised in London, he makes hishome in Washington, DC. Today we’re going to talk about his latest thriller: The Slate.
Learn more at matthewfitzsimmons.com.
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As owner and President at BookEnds, Jessica Faust is honored to spend every day with some of the most talented authors and agents in the business. From BookEnds’ inception in 1999, Jessica works tirelessly to advocate for those she works with from clients to the team at BookEnds. In addition to growing BookEnds in new and innovative directions, Jessica represents many bestselling and award-winning authors. Her focus is on bringing more underrepresented and marginalized voices into publishing and her areas of expertise include mystery, suspense, upmarket, literary, speculative, and women's fiction. In nonfiction, she’s seeking books and authors who will make her a better person and a better leader.
Jessica began her career as an acquisitions editor at Berkley Publishing, Macmillan, and Wiley. In addition to nearly 15 years of blogging, Jessica has a regular role on the BookEnds YouTube channel, Instagram account, and Tiktok; has taught at New York University's Continuing Education Program; written a publishing column; and has been honored by a number of different publishing organizations. Jessica hosts workshops and speaking engagements throughout the world and is a member of AALA.While her heart will always be in Minnesota, Jessica now lives in New Jersey with her family. Outside of BookEnds, Jessica’s passions include kettlebell lifting, walking Olive, skiing, paddle boarding, cooking, baking, reading other people's books, and generally laughing with friends and family.
Learn more at bookendsliterary.com
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C.H. Hooks is the author of the novels Can't Shake the Dust (2024) and Alligator Zoo-Park Magic (2019). His work has appeared in print and online publications including: The Los Angeles Review, American Short Fiction, Four Way Review, The Tampa Review, The Bitter Southerner, and Burrow Press. He has been a Tennessee Williams Scholar and Contributor at Sewanee Writers' Conference, and attended DISQUIET: Dzanc Books International Literary Program. He teaches at Flagler College, and lives and sails in St. Augustine.
Learn more at CHHOOKS.COM
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Today, we’re speaking to Molly Harper and her audiobook narrator, Amanda Ronconi. Molly Harper is the USA Today Bestselling author of more than forty paranormal romance, contemporary romance, young adult and mystery titles, most of them through Simon & Schuster, Audible and Sourcebooks Casablanca. Her first book, Nice Girls Don’t Have Fangs, came out in 2009. Her latest Audible Exclusive project, the Starfall Point series, launched recently with Witches Get Stuff Done. Most of her titles are available in print, ebook and audio at all major book retailers.
Amanda Ronconi is an actress and narrator who divides her time between New York City and upstate New York. She has a BFA from NYU, where she studied at the Stella Adler Conservatory
Learn more at mollyharper.com and amandaronconi.com
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Kellye Garrett’s first novel, Hollywood Homicide, was named one of BookBub’s Top 100 Crime Novels of All Time. In addition to receiving starred reviews from Publishers Weekly and Library Journal, it won the Agatha, Anthony, Lefty, and Independent Publisher “IPPY” awards for best first novel. It was also nominated for the Macavity Award for Best First Mystery Novel and Barry award for Best Paperback Original. Kellye previously spent 8 years working in Hollywood, including a stint writing for the CBS drama Cold Case. People were always surprised to learn what she did for a living—probably because she seemed way too happy to be brainstorming ways to murder people. A former magazine editor, Kellye holds a B.S. in magazine writing from Florida A&M and an MFA in screenwriting from USC’s famed film school. Having moved back to her native New Jersey, she spends her mornings commuting to Manhattan for her job at a leading media company—while still happily brainstorming ways to commit murder. Her latest novel is award-winning Like A Sister about a black woman in New York City looking into the mysterious overdose of her estranged reality star sister. In addition to being featured on the TODAY show, the suspense novel was a Book of the Month April 2022 selection, the Oxygen channel’s July Book Club pick, an Edgar award finalist for Best Novel and Lefty award winner for Best Mystery.
Learn more at kellyegarrett.com.
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Stanley Milford, Jr., graduated from the United States Indian Police Academy at the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center in Artesia, New Mexico, and worked continuously as a sworn law enforcement officer for over twenty-three years. He served as the delegated Chief Navajo Ranger for over two years through March of 2019. While with the Navajo Rangers, Stan oversaw a section called the Special Projects Unit (SPU), whose responsibilities included the investigation of cases that did not fit within everyday parameters of law enforcement or criminal investigation, many of which involved reports of the paranormal or supernatural. After leaving the Navajo Rangers, Stan served as the senior investigator for the Navajo Nation’s White Collar Crime Unit. His novel is: The Paranormal Ranger
Learn more here.
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Lisa Williamson Rosenberg is the author of Embers on the Wind. She is a former ballet dancer and psychotherapist specializing in depression, developmental trauma, and multiracial identity. Her essays have appeared in Literary Hub, Longreads, Narratively, Mamalode, and The Common. Her fiction has been published in the Piltdown Review and in Literary Mama, where LISA received a Pushcart nomination. A born-and-raised New Yorker and mother of two college students, Lisa now lives in Montclair, New Jersey, with her husband and dog. Her latest novel is Mirror Me.
Learn more at LisaKRosenberg.com
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Anna Johnston is a former baby, aspiring octogenarian and emerging Australian author with a love for the heartfelt and hilarious. She grew up in country Victoria before moving to Melbourne where she lives joyously with her husband and daughters by the beach. Anna left an imminent career in medicine to follow her heart into her grandfather’s nursing home where she became the social support coordinator, taking great delight in shaking up the usual program. When injury left her unable to continue working in aged care, she began to write about it, channeling her love for older people onto the page. Anna has enjoyed a lifelong passion for theatre, screenplay, travel, and creative writing.
Her latest novel is The Borrowed Life of Frederick Fife.
Learn more at annajohnstonauthor.com
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Erin Quinn-Kong is a longtime magazine editor. Currently managing editor of Texas Highways, she has also been an editor at Austin Monthly, Us Weekly, and Allure. She is a graduate of the University of Missouri School of Journalism and lives in Austin, TX, with her husband and their two children. Her debut novel is Hate Follow.
Learn more at erinquinnkong.com
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AurélieThiele is a French American writer and engineering professor living in Dallas, TX. She has studied writing at the UCLA Extension School and Bennington Writing Seminars, and holds a PhD in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from MIT. Her love of opera started when she was a high school student and her parents would take her to the opera at La Monnaie in Brussels. She can’t sing but if she could, she would probably be a mezzo-soprano.
Learn more at AurélieThiele.com
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Maria Vetrano tried to save the whales when she was nine years old. It didn’t quite work. But that didn’t quell her desire to ease some of the world’s ills in some small way, even if only through fiction. She is the mother of one young adult daughter and currently lives with her wife and animal family in Massachusetts. When she’s not writing, Maria is the principal of Vetrano Communications, the PR and marketing firm she founded in 2004 that specializes in tech clientele. Maria is also a lounge singer who’s entertained audiences in Boston, Cambridge, and Provincetown. Along with her wife, she created Against the Tide, a fundraising event to fight breast cancer. She is a graduate of Colgate University with a BA in English literature. Her novel is QUEEN BESS: A Tudor Comes to Save America. Learn more at https://queen-bess.com
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What does it take to be a juror of the Pulitzer Prize in Fiction? Former columnist for the New York Times Review, Danielle Trussoni, discusses her experiences on both sides of the page-as writer and reviewer. She gives us a peek into a typical writing day and shares information about The San Miguel Writers Conference.
Danielle Trussoni is a New York Times and Internationally bestselling author of seven books. She has been the chair jurist of the Pulitzer Prize in Fiction and a book columnist for The New York Times Book Review. Her novels have been translated into over thirty languages. She has lived in Japan, England, Bulgaria, France, The United States and Mexico. She currently lives in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, with her family. Her latest novel, which David Baldacci said, “This novel has it all and more,” is The Puzzle Box.Learn more at Danielletrussoni.com
https://sanmiguelwritersconference.org
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Crystal King on her new novel and the one change she made that improved her writing exponentially.
Crystal King is the author of IN THE GARDEN OF MONSTERS, THE CHEF'S SECRET, and FEAST OF SORROW, which was long-listed for the Center for Fiction’s First Novel Prize and was a Must Read for the MassBook Awards. She is an author, culinary enthusiast, and marketing expert. Her writing is fueled by a love of history and a passion for the food, language, and culture of Italy. She has taught classes in writing, creativity, and social media at several universities including Harvard Extension School and Boston University, as well as at GrubStreet, one of the leading creative writing centers in the US. A Pushcart Prize–nominated poet and former co-editor of the online literary arts journal Plum Ruby Review, Crystal received her MA in critical and creative thinking from UMass Boston, where she developed a series of exercises and writing prompts to help fiction writers in medias res. She resides in Boston. Her latest novel is In the Garden of Monsters.
Learn more at crystalking.com
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Daniel Kraus is a New York Times bestselling writer of novels, TV, and film. He shares his process, the research required for Whalefall, and a preview of his latest novel, Pay the Piper.
Whalefall received a front-cover review in the New York Times Book Review, won the Alex Award, was an L.A. Times Book Prize Finalist, and was a Best Book of 2023 from NPR, the New York Times, Amazon, Chicago Tribune, and more.
With Guillermo del Toro, he co-authored The Shape of Water, based on the same idea the two created for the Oscar-winning film. Also with del Toro, Kraus co-authored Trollhunters, which was adapted into the Emmy-winning Netflix series. His also cowrote The Living Dead and Pay the Piper with legendary filmmaker George A. Romero. Kraus’s The Death and Life of Zebulon Finch was named one of Entertainment Weekly‘s Top 10 Books of the Year. Kraus has won the Bram Stoker Award, Scribe Award, two Odyssey Awards (for both Rotters and Scowler), and has appeared multiple times as Library Guild selections, YALSA Best Fiction for Young Adults, and more. Kraus’s work has been translated into over 20 languages. He lives with his wife in Chicago.
Learn more at: danielkraus.com.
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What does it take to publish seventy-five books? RaeAnne Thayne breaks it down. From her days as a journalist to navigating writing around raising a family and caring for a child with special needs, RaeAnne shares her process and responds to one listener's question about locking down the right point-of-view.
New York Times, USA Today, Wall Street Journal and #1 Publishers Weekly bestselling author RaeAnne Thayne has written more than 70 books since selling her first book in 1995. She has received a career achievement award from Romantic Times for series romantic adventure, as well as a Pioneer of Romance award. She finds inspiration from the beautiful mountains of northern Utah, where she lives with her family.
Her books have been described as “poignant and sweet,” with “beautiful, honest storytelling (that) goes straight to the heart.”
Learn more at: raeannethayne.com
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Rose Carlyle is a lawyer and an adventurer with first class honours degrees in law and creative writing. Rose has crewed on scientific yachting expeditions to subantarctic islands and has sailed her own yacht from Thailand to South Africa. She currently lives in New Zealand with her three children. Her debut novel, The Girl in the Mirror, was an instant number-one bestseller in New Zealand, was translated into eight languages, and has been optioned for the screen. Her second novel is No One Will Know.
Learn more at RoseCarlyle.com
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Appellate judge and Edgar-award-winning author of ten novels of crime fiction, David Ellis dishes on writing independently and coauthoring eight bestselling books with James Patterson. He discusses what he's learned about pacing and plotting from Patterson.
David's novels have been translated into more than ten languages worldwide. In December 2014, Dave was sworn in as the youngest-serving Justice of the Illinois Appellate Court for the First District. He lives outside Chicago with his wife and three children. His latest novel is The Best Lies.
Learn more at: davidellis.com
Jamespatterson.com
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Gill Paul has written thirteen historical novels, many of them re-evaluating extraordinary 20th-century women whom she thinks have been marginalized or misjudged by historians. Her books have reached the top of theUS, Canadian, and UK charts, and have been translated into twenty-three languages. Gill was born and raised in Scotland, apart from an eventful year at school in the US when she was ten. She worked as an editor in nonfiction publishing, then as a ghostwriter, before giving up the “day job” to write fiction full-time. She is also an events organizer for the Historical Writers Association. Gill loves wild swimming year-round, arranging parties, and traveling whenever and wherever she can. Her latest novel is Scandalous Women.
Learn more at Gill Paul.com
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Hadley Leggett writes layered book club fiction exploring truth in shades of gray. Before becoming a novelist, her winding career path included degrees in medicine, biochemistry, Spanish, and science journalism, as well as a ten-year stint as a stay-at-home mom. She began writing fiction — her secret lifelong dream — when her youngest child started preschool and she finally got a moment to herself.
Hadley's short stories and essays have appeared in the Bellevue Literary Review, Literary Mama, and Halfway Down the Stairs, and her science writing can be found at Wired.com and Stanford News. She lives in Seattle with her husband and three children, as well as her parents, three cats, and an ever-rotating troop of foster kittens. When she’s not writing, you can find her swimming laps, poring over a jigsaw puzzle, or buying too many books.
Learn more at: hadleyleggett.com
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Sara Goodman Confino dishes about her path to publishing, her mad love for everything Springsteen, researching her latest novel, and the story behind the cover of Behind Every Good Man.
Confino teaches high school English and journalism in Montgomery County, Maryland, where she lives with her husband, two sons, and miniature schnauzer, Sandy. When she’s not writing or working out, she can be found on the beach or at a Springsteen show, sometimes even dancing on stage.
Learn more at saraconfino.com
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Jaclyn Goldis is a graduate of the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, and NYU Law. She practiced trust and estate law at a large Chicago firm for seven years before leaving her job to travel the world and write novels. She is the author of When We Were Young, The Chateau, and her latest, The Main Character.
For more information visit jaclyngoldis.com
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Moon Unit Zappa was born in 1967 to legendary musician Frank Vincent Zappa and his second wife, Gail Zappa. At the age of fourteen, Moon Zappa appeared in Frank Zappa’s career defining music video, “Valley Girl,” which later helped jump-start Moon’s own career. Since then, Moon has worked as an actress, writer, comedian, artist, businesswoman, and podcaster. Moon has written a memoir of growing up in her unconventional household in 1970s Los Angeles, coming of age in the Hollywood Hills in the 1980s as the “Valley Girl,” gaining momentum as an accidental VJ on a new network called MTV, and finding herself after losing her father, then her mother, and the testing of her most important relationships.
Learn more at moonunit.com.
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**Melissa Payne is the bestselling author of four novels, including A Light in the Forest and The Night of Many Endings. After an early career raising money for nonprofit organizations, Melissa began dreaming about becoming a published author and wrote her first novel. Her stories feature small mountain towns with characters searching for redemption, love, and second chances. They have been three-time Colorado Book Award finalists and Colorado Authors League 2019 and 2023 winners for mainstream fiction. She enjoys speaking about her writing journey at book clubs, literary festivals and in interviews. She believes that everyone has a story to share. Her upcoming novel, The Wild Road Home, will be released March of 2024. Melissa lives in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains with her husband and three children, a friendly mutt, a very loud cat, and the occasional bear.
For more information, visit www.melissapayneauthor.com or find her on Instagram @melissapayne_writes.**
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A native of Long Island, New York, Guggenheim is an Emmy Award-winning writer and producer of television shows (ARROW, DC'S LEGENDS OF TOMORROW, TROLLHUNTERS, CARNIVAL ROW), movies (GREEN LANTERN, PERCY JACKSON - SEA OF MONSTERS), comic books (X-MEN GOLD, BLADE), video games (CALL OF DUTY 3, SINGULARITY), and novels (OVERWATCH).In addition, his work includes projects for popular franchises such as Perry Jackson, Star Wars, Call of Duty, Star Trek, and Planet of the Apes. Guggenheim currently lives in Los Angeles with his wife Tara, a fellow TV writer and WGA nominee, and the showrunner of REAPER and AGENT CARTER. They have two daughters and four pets.
About Guggenheim’s novel, In Any Lifetime, Guillermo Del Toro said, “Marc Guggenheim is one of the great imaginative minds of our medium, and a born storyteller, yarn weaver, and world creator of the highest order. Dive in.”
Learn more at: marcguggenheim.substackcom
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Tara Sim offers a glimpse into writing YA fantasy novels steeped in established mythologies and the "Write to Your Heart Trash" theory she sticks by.
Tara is the author of The Dark Gods trilogy, the Scavenge the Stars duology, and the Timekeeper trilogy who can typically be found wandering the wilds of the Bay Area, California. When she’s not chasing cats or lurking in bookstores, she writes books about magic, murder, and mayhem.
Learn more at TaraSim.com
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Born and raised in North London, Caves is the internationally bestselling author of A Killer Came Knocking and I Know Where She Is, which The Sun described as 'sinister, unsettling and gripping'. SB now lives in South London with his wife and two sons. His latest novel is the high concept locked-room thriller, Honeycomb.
Learn more at sbcaves.com
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Yasmin Angoe is the Anthony-nominated author of the critically acclaimed thriller Her Name Is Knight of the Nena Knight series. She is a first-generation Ghanaian American and, in 2020, received the Eleanor Taylor Bland Award for Emerging Writers of Color from Sisters in Crime. Yasmin’s books were an Amazon Best Book of the Month for Mystery, Thriller & Suspense, and an Editor’s Pick. Her work has received numerous recognitions, was on a billboard in Times Square, Best Of lists, and a Library Journal Starred Review. The Nena Knight series was also optioned for a television series.
Her Name Is Knight has appeared in the New York Times Book Review, OprahDaily.com, POPSUGAR, Nerd Daily, the Washington Independent Review of Books, The Guardian, and other platforms. Yasmin is a proud member of several prestigious organizations, such as Crime Writers of Color, Sisters in Crime, Mystery Writers of America, International Thriller Writers, and the Women’s National Book Association. Yasmin is a former English teacher and instructional coach, and lives in South Carolina with her husband and their kids. Her latest novel is NOT WHAT SHE SEEMS.
Learn more at: yasminangoe.com
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A New York Times bestselling author, professor and Shakespeare scholar (with degrees from Harvard University, Oxford University and Yale University), Eloisa has published more than 30 historical romances, as well as a bestselling memoir, Paris in Love, and a contemporary novel, Lizzie and Dante. Her books are published in 28 languages and 30 countries, from Slovakia to Sweden. Worldwide, she has approximately 7 million books published in print or electronically. She lives in New York City and Florence, Italy.
Learn more at eloisajames.com
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Michael Callahan shares a few of his lucky breaks: the magazine article that brought him to the threshold of writing his first novel, Searching for Grace Kelly, and the invitation to Anna Wintour's house where he met the editor of Vanity Fair.
Michael is a contributing editor at Vanity Fair and the author of the critically acclaimed novels SEARCHING FOR GRACE KELLY (2015), THE NIGHT SHE WON MISS AMERICA (2017), and THE LOST LETTERS FROM MARTHA'S VINEYARD (2024). His articles have appeared in more than two dozen national magazines, including Departures, Men's Journal, The Hollywood Reporter, Bloomberg Businessweek, and Town & Country. He lives in Los Angeles. His latest novel is The Lost Letters from Martha's Vineyard.
For more information visit callahanwrites . net
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Lori Brand is a lifting enthusiast, group fitness instructor, yoga teacher, and software quality engineer. In past lives, she’s been a gymnast, dancer, Playboy model, and bodybuilder. Her time in the body wars trenches led to her realization that getting strong, rather than shrinking, is the way out. In an effort to spread the word, she’s had articles published in STRONG Fitness Magazine, T-Nation, Inside Fitness Magazine, D’FYNE Fitness Magazine, and more.Her debut novel is A Body to Die For.
Learn more at: loribrandwrites.com
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New York Times bestselling author Lexi Blake lives in North Texas with her husband and three kids. Since starting her publishing journey in 2010, she’s sold over three million copies of her books. She began writing at a young age, concentrating on plays and journalism. It wasn’t until she started writing romance that she found success. She likes to find humor in the strangest places and believes in happy endings.
For more information visit www.LexiBlake.net
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Namrata Patel is an Indian-American author who lives in Boston. Her writing examines diaspora, dual-cultural identity among Indian-Americans and explores this dynamic while also touching on both—the family’s we’re born with and those we choose. Namrata has lived in India, Spokane, London, and New York City. Namrata has been writing for most of her adult life and loves creating characters who are relatable and aspirational. Her heroines range from quiet to kick-ass and her heroes are swoon-worthy, if a little flawed. Her first novel The Candid Life of Meena Dave was long listed for Best First Novel Prize by The Center for Fiction. Namrata’s second novel The Scent of a Garden was published in 2023, and her third novel The Curious Secrets of Yesterday is out now.For more information visit www.nampatel.com.
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Lauren Thoman writes speculative fiction for teens and adults. Her debut novel, I'll Stop the World, was selected for publication in 2023 by six-time Emmy nominee Mindy Kaling through her eponymous imprint, Mindy's Book Studio. Lauren's pop culture writing has also appeared in numerous online outlets including Parade and Vulture. Lauren lives outside of Nashville, Tennessee, with her husband and two children in a house full of dogs and fish. When she's not writing, she's probably on the hunt for tacos or coffee, poking around her flowerbeds, or buried underneath a pile of dogs.
For more information visit www.LaurenThomanWrites.com
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JJ McAvoy has written numerous independently published novels that have been translated into six languages and are bestsellers in Turkey, Israel, and France. Her historical romance series featuring the Du Bells includes Aphrodite and the Duke, Verity and the Forbidden Suitor, and Hathor and the Prince.
Learn more about JJ at: jjmcavoy.com
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Gina DeMillo Wagner is an award-winning journalist and author. Her writing has been featured in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Memoir Magazine, Modern Loss, Self, Outside, CRAFT Literary, and other publications. She is a winner of the CRAFT Creative Nonfiction Award, and her memoir was longlisted for the 2022 SFWP Literary prize. Gina has a master’s degree in journalism and is cofounder of Watershed creative writing and art workshops. She lives and works near Boulder, Colorado. Her memoir is Forces of Nature.
Learn more at ginaDwagner.com
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Victoria Helen Stone, author of the runaway best seller Jane Doe, writes critically acclaimed novels of dark intrigue and emotional suspense. Aside from At The Quiet Edge, The Last One Home, Problem Child, Half Past, and the chart-topping False Step and Evelyn, After, she also published twenty-nine books as USA Today bestselling author Victoria Dahl and won the prestigious American Library Association Reading List award for best genre fiction. Her novels have been published in eighteen languages. Victoria writes in her home office high in the Wasatch Mountains of Utah, far from her origins in the flattest plains of Minnesota, Texas, and Oklahoma. She enjoys gorgeous summer trail hikes in the mountains almost as much as she enjoys staying inside by the fire during winter. Victoria is passionate about dessert, true crime, and her terror of mosquitoes, which have targeted her in a diabolical conspiracy to hunt her down no matter the season.
Learn more at Victoriahelenstone.com
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Jenna Bush Hager has included Kirsten Miller's latest novel, Lula Dean's Little Library of Banned Books, in her list of 5 Books to Read this Summer. Kirsten stops by the Writing Table for a fun chat about small towns, book bans, and what has inspired her favorite characters.
Kirsten Miller grew up in a small town in the mountains of North Carolina. At seventeen, she left for college in New York City, where she lives to this day. Kirsten's latest novel, Lula Dean's Little Library of Banned Books, is a side-splitting satire that takes on some of the most controversial issues of our day. Her first adult novel, The Change, was a Good Morning America Book Club pick for May 2022. Kirsten is also the author of over a dozen middle grade and YA novels, including the acclaimed Kiki Strike books, (which tell the tale of the delinquent girl geniuses who keep Manhattan safe), and How to Lead a Life of Crime. She is not the Kirsten Miller who wrote All That Is Left (which sometimes appears on the list of the books she's written), but she assumes that Kirsten is lovely and talented. Kirsten’s latest novel is Lula Dean’s Little Library of Banned Books.
For more information visit www.KirstenMillerBooks.com
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Elle Marr is the author of thrillers THE MISSING SISTER (2020), LIES WE BURY (2021), STRANGERS WE KNOW (2022), THE FAMILY BONES (2023), and THE ALONE TIME (2024). She is (evidently) a fan of coffee. Her work has been featured in PopSugar, Woman’s World Magazine, CBS affiliate KOIN-TV, ABC affiliate KATU-TV, and Audible. THE MISSING SISTER was a #1 Amazon bestseller and an Amazon Charts bestseller, while LIES WE BURY earned a Kirkus starred review, and STRANGERS WE KNOW was an Audible Most Anticipated Thriller. Publishers Weekly gave a starred review to THE FAMILY BONES, saying “Readers will be captivated from the very first page.” Her forthcoming novel THE ALONE TIME was chosen as the Amazon First Read for April 2024, while Library Journal said it has “a finale that will surprise even the most perceptive readers.” Originally from Sacramento, Elle Marr graduated from UC San Diego before moving to France, where she earned a master’s degree from the Sorbonne University in Paris. When not working on her next book, she enjoys watching French Netflix shows with the subtitles off, in Oregon, where she lives with her family.
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In this episode, Jaclyn and Kris introduce their rescue pups, Bogey and Indy, discuss Jaclyn's journey into writing, and the story behind her debut, Dear Dotty.
Jaclyn Westlake is an alumna of the Stanford Continuing Studies Novel Writing Program. A former recruiter turned career advice columnist, her work has appeared in Forbes, Business Insider, and Inc. She lives in California with her husband and their dachshund mix, Indiana Jones (but you can call him Indy). Pickles are her favorite food, and Dear Dotty is her first novel.
Learn more at: jaclynwestlake.com
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Special thanks to the publisher and to NetGalley for providing an advance copy of Jaclyn's debut.
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Acclaimed author Suzanne Park returns with a charming and compelling novel about an aspiring tech entrepreneur who goes on a rollercoaster journey of self-discovery after her app, which sends messages to loved ones after you pass, accidentally sends her final words to all the important people in her life—including the venture capital mentor she’s crushing on.Suzanne Park is a Korean American writer who was born and raised in Tennessee. In her former life as a stand-up comedian, Suzanne appeared on BET, was the winner of the Seattle Sierra Mist Comedy Competition, and was a semi-finalist in NBC's "Stand Up For Diversity" showcase.
Suzanne graduated from Columbia University and received an MBA Degree from UCLA. She currently resides in Los Angeles with her husband, female offspring, and a sneaky rat that creeps around on her back patio. In her spare time, she procrastinates. Her comedic novels have been featured in “best of” lists in NPR, Elle, Popsugar, Real Simple, Country Living, Bustle, Buzzfeed, Marie Claire, Parade, Shondaland and The Today Show.
Special thanks to the publisher and to NetGalley for an advance copy of One Last Word.
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Follow the Writing Table:
On Twitter/X: @writingtablepc
Everywhere else: @writingtablepodcast
Email questions or tell us who you'd like us to invite to the Writing Table: writingtablepodcast@gmail.com.
Elka Ray is the Canadian author of Divorce is Murder and Killer Coin. Born in the UK and raised in Canada, Elka has two previous novels, Saigon Dark and Hanoi Jane; a short-story collection, What You Don't Know; and a series of children's picture books about Vietnam, where she currently lives with her family. Elka grew up in Victoria, B.C. Canada, the setting for her latest mystery. When she's not writing, drawing, or reading, Elka is in the ocean.
Learn more at elkaray.com
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Jenny Colgan gives us a look behind the castle walls, sharing stories of her game show experiences, her adoration for Terminator movies, her work on Dr. Who, and how she finds inspiration to keep creating humorous, heartfelt novels like her latest, The Summer Skies.
Jenny Colgan is the New York Times bestselling author of numerous novels, including The Christmas Bookshop, The Bookshop on the Corner, Little Beach Street Bakery, and Christmas at the Cupcake Café. Jenny, her husband, and three children live in a genuine castle in Scotland.
Learn more at: Jennycolgan.com
Special thanks to the Sleep Life Podcast and the Comfort Blanket Podcast.
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Kathleen M. Basi is the quintessential jack-of-all trades writer: musical composer and songwriter, feature writer, essayist, nonfiction author, and of course, storyteller. Basi spent her childhood drawing inspiration for stories from the fields and trees on her family's farm...when she wasn't climbing on tractors and jumping off hay bales. Now, as mother to three rambunctious boys and one chromosomally gifted daughter, she doesn't have to look any farther than her kitchen table.
Learn more at kathleenbasi.com
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Katherine Reay is a national bestselling and award-winning author of several novels. She has enjoyed a lifelong affair with books and history and brings that love to her stories. Katherine has also written one full-length nonfiction work. She holds a BA and MS from Northwestern University, graduating Phi Beta Kappa, and has lived across the country with a few years in England and Ireland as well. A full-time author and mother of three children, Katherine and her husband currently live outside Chicago, IL. Her latest novel is: The Berlin Letters.
Learn more at katherinereay.com
X: @katherine_reay
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Lynne Golodner writes emotional novels with compelling
Jewish characters who are determined to fill their lives with
passion, purpose and love. Her first novel, Woman of Valor,
joins a body of work that includes two poetry collections and
six nonfiction books, including Hide and Seek: Jewish Women
and Hair Covering and The Flavors of Faith: Holy Breads.
Lynne is a writing coach, marketing entrepreneur and host of
the Make Meaning Podcast, and her creative nonfiction has
been published around the world. With a BA from University
of Michigan and an MFA from Goddard College, Lynne is the
mother of four and lives in Huntington Woods, Michigan,
with her husband, Dan.
Learn more at lynnegolodner.com.
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Nick Petrie received his MFA in fiction from the University of Washington and won a Hopwood Award for short fiction while an undergraduate at the University of Michigan. His story “At the Laundromat” won the 2006 Short Story Contest in The Seattle Review, a national literary journal.
His first novel, The Drifter, won the ITW Thriller and Barry Awards, and was nominated for Edgar, Anthony, and Hammett Awards. He won the 2016 Literary Award from the Wisconsin Library Association and was named one of Apple’s 10 Writers to Read in 2017. Light It Up was named the Best Thriller of 2018 by Apple Books. Both Light it Up and The Wild One were shortlisted for the Barry Award.
His books in the Peter Ash series are The Drifter, Burning Bright, Light It Up, Tear It Down, The Wild One, The Breaker, and The Runaway. A husband and father, he has worked as a carpenter, remodeling contractor, and building inspector. He lives in Milwaukee, where he is hard at work on the next Peter Ash novel, the latest: The Price You Pay.
Learn more at: : NickPetrie.com
Twitter: @_NickPetrie_
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A.H. Kim (Ann) was born in Seoul, South Korea and immigrated to the U.S. as a young child. Ann was educated at Harvard College and Berkeley Law School, where she was an editor of the California Law Review. Ann practiced corporate law for many years and served as chief of staff to the CEO and as head of investor relations at a Fortune 200 company. Ann is the proud mother of two sons, a longtime cancer survivor, and community volunteer. After raising her family in the Bay Area, Ann and her husband now call Ann Arbor home. Ann's debut novel, A GOOD FAMILY, was inspired by her personal experience supporting her brother and nieces while her sister-in-law served time in Alderson Women’s Prison Camp. Ann’s second novel, RELATIVE STRANGERS is a contemporary retelling of Sense and Sensibility and explores themes of love, loss, grief, and forgiveness. RELATIVE STRANGERS will be published in April 2024.
Learn more at: ahkim.net
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Heather Frese is the author of the novel The Baddest Girl on the Planet, winner of the Lee Smith Novel Prize. She has published numerous short stories, essays, and the occasional poem. Her work has appeared in Michigan Quarterly Review, the Los Angeles Review, Front Porch, the Barely South Review, Switchback, and elsewhere, earning notable mention in the Pushcart Prize Anthology and Best American Essays. Heather received her M.F.A. from West Virginia University and has a master’s degree from Ohio University. Coastal North Carolina is her longtime love and source of inspiration, her writing deeply influenced by the wild magic and history of the Outer Banks. A native Ohioan, she currently writes, edits, and wrangles three small children in Raleigh, North Carolina.
Learn more at: Heatherfrese.com
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L. R. Jones is a pseudonym for New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Lisa Renee Jones, whose dark, edgy fiction includes the highly acclaimed novels The Poet, A Perfect Lie, and the Lilah Love series. Prior to publishing, Lisa owned a multistate staffing agency recognized by the Austin Business Journal. Lisa was listed as #7 in Entrepreneur magazine’s list of growing women-owned businesses. She lives in Colorado with her husband, a cat who always has something to say, and a golden retriever who’s afraid of her own bark. Her latest novel is The Wedding Party.
Learn more at: lisareneejones.com.
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Parisa Akhbari (@authorparisa) is a mental health therapist and writer from Seattle, Washington. Her debut YA novel, Just Another Epic Love Poem, follows two queer best friends in Catholic school as they fall in love through the pages of a never-ending poem they’ve been writing back and forth for five years. When not writing or therapizing, Parisa can be found trying to replicate her grandmother’s drool-worthy Persian recipes, riding ferries around the Puget Sound, and dancing around the kitchen with her wife and dogs.
Learn more at parisawrites.com.
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Jeff quit a perfectly good job at the age of 47 to return to college for his MFA, and his first novel, Other People’s Children (Simon and Schuster, 2021), emerged from that silly decision. His second Novel, Like It Never Happened, will be released by Crooked Lane Books on March 5, 2024.
In addition to his two novels, Jeff’s writing has been published in The Sun, Booth, Harpur Palate, and Publishers Weekly. He was the winner of the Madison Review’s Chris O’Malley Prize in Fiction and a finalist for the Missouri Review’s Jeffrey E. Smith Editor’s Prize.
He is a passionate proponent of the Oxford comma, a mediocre men’s league hockey player, and a fair-weather fan of the Chicago Blackhawks. He was born and raised in St. Louis and now lives in Elmhurst, Illinois, with his wife and two children.
Learn more at: JeffHoffmannWrites.com
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Andie Burke began college as an English major before jumping into a pediatric nursing career. Her writing is inspired by over a decade spent working in hospitals with patients of all ages. After the last couple years spent in the pandemic ER, she escaped to an outpatient pediatric sedation unit.
Andie lives in a blue house in Maryland with an alarming number of books and an embarrassing number of ultra-fine point pens. When she’s not writing, she’s probably feeding snacks to the two small human creatures who live with her or trying not to kill her chaotic houseplants. You can find her on Bookstagram adding to her ever-expanding TBR or letting her ADHD brain happily dissociate while listening to Taylor Swift. She is the author of Fly With Me and Fall for Him.
Learn more at andieburke.com
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**Rebecca Hanover is the New York Times bestselling author of THE SIMILARS duology. After graduating from Stanford University with a BA in English and drama, Rebecca joined the writing team of the CBS daytime drama GUIDING LIGHT, where she earned an Emmy Award. Still, she never lost her love of books—particularly YA. She now writes Young Adult as well as adult novels full-time from her home in San Francisco, where she enjoys matcha lattes and a complete lack of seasons. When she isn’t writing, she can be found in a yoga class or reading anything Dav Pilkey with her husband and three kiddos.
Learn more at rebeccahanover.com**
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Sheila Athens writes smart fiction set where the South meets the Sunshine state. Her stories are about women seeking to find the peace we all deserve—whether they’re battling an external foe or an internal one (or both). Readers are drawn to her work because they believe that everyday heroes can make a difference in our world.
After growing up in the Ozarks, she moved—sight unseen—to Northeast Florida with the man who would eventually become her husband. Thirty-five years later, she’s still on the shores of the Atlantic, grateful her two grown sons and their families live nearby.
She spent three decades in corporate America, most of it as a vice president of human resources. Though she did recruiting, training, and all the other disciplines of the field, she loved the employee relations aspect the most. It gave her a front row seat to the study of human nature, which is great fodder for a writer.
She’s a feminist, a lover of nature, a writer hiker, and an audiobook enthusiast. Her late husband did all the cooking at their house, so she’s having a fun time teaching herself how to cook.
Sheila now has two natural states: Talking books with readers and other writers OR staying firmly ensconced in her quiet little lair, where she reads, writes and communes with the ducks who live on the lake right off her back porch. Her latest novel is Neena Lee is Seeing Things.
Learn more at shielaathens.com
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Katherine Howe is a New York Times bestselling and award-winning historian and novelist. She is the author of several novels for adults and young adults, has edited two volumes of primary sources for Penguin Classics, and is the co-author with Anderson Cooper of the #1 New York Times bestselling books VANDERBILT and ASTOR.
Her newest novel, a mystery adventure set in the Golden Age of Piracy called A TRUE ACCOUNT: HANNAH MASURY'S SOJOURN AMONGST THE PYRATES, WRITTEN BY HERSELF came out in the US and the UK on November 21, 2023.
Katherine has appeared on “Good Morning America,” “CBS This Morning,” NPR’s “Weekend Edition,” the BBC, the History Channel, Smithsonian TV, the Travel Channel, and she hosted “Salem: Unmasking the Devil” for National Geographic. Her fiction has been translated into over twenty languages. She holds a BA in art history and philosophy from Columbia and an MA in American and New England studies from Boston University. A native Houstonian and avid sailor, she lives in New England with her family, where she is at work on her next book. One time, as a child, she looked up into the eye of a hurricane. She also puts hot sauce on everything.
Learn more at katherinehowe.com
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Laurie Frankel is the New York Times bestselling, award-winning author of four (going on five) novels. Her writing has also appeared in The New York Times, The Guardian, Publisher’s Weekly, People Magazine, Lit Hub, The Sydney Morning Herald, and other publications. She is the recipient of the Washington State Book Award and the Endeavor Award. Her novels have been translated into more than twenty-five languages and been optioned for film and TV. A former college professor, she now writes full-time in Seattle, Washington where she lives with her family and makes good soup.
Learn more at lauriefrankel.net
Do you have a question for a Writing Table guest author? Email Kris at writingtablepodcast@gmail.com.
Follow us on Twitter: @writingtablepc
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Sarahlyn Bruck writes contemporary, book club fiction and is the award-winning author of three novels: Light of the Fire (coming January 2024), Daytime Drama (2021), and Designer You (2018). When she’s not writing, Sarahlyn moonlights as a full-time writing and literature professor at a local community college. She’s also a co-host of the pop culture podcast, Pretty Much Pop. From Northern California, she now lives in Philadelphia with her family.
Learn more at sarahlynbruck.com and follow her on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter at @sarahlynbruck.
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Katrina Kittle remembers thinking of herself as a writer way back in grade school, although she never thought about writing for publication until she graduated from college. Former classmates to this day tease her about the interminable stories she was always writing about horses or bands of stray animals. She inherited this love of books and storytelling from her dad, who encouraged her to read great books long before the same titles were required in school. Her dad still greets her at the door whenever she visits with, “Did you bring me any books?” Her curiosity, imagination, and passion for adventure come from her mom, who taught her always to look at the world with the discovering eyes of a child. Katrina has written several novels for adults—The Blessings of the Animals,The Kindness of Strangers,Two Truths and a Lie,and Traveling Light—and one for young adults, Reasons to be Happy.
Her characters are people we know, people we are, people we’ve been. They find themselves in circumstances they never imagined they’d face, and we are compelled to follow them as they find their way home, heal what’s broken, and discover strength they didn’t know they had. Katrina’s new novel, Morning in This Broken World, was an Amazon First Reads pick for August.
Learn more at Katrina.kittle.com
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PEG TYRE, the bestselling author of The Trouble with Boys, was, until recently, a senior writer at Newsweek specializing in social trends and education. She has won numerous awards, including a Pulitzer Prize, a Clarion Award, and a National Education Writers Association Award. She lives in New York City with her husband, novelist Peter Blauner, and their two sons.
Her acclaimed novel, Strangers in the Night, was recently rereleased twenty-seven years after its original publication.
Learn more at pegtyre.com
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Erin Hoover was born in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. She is the author of two poetry collections: Barnburner (Elixir, 2018), which won the Antivenom Poetry Award and a Florida Book Award, and No Spare People (Black Lawrence, 2023). Her poems have appeared in The Best American Poetry and in journals such as Cincinnati Review, Poetry Northwest, Shenandoah, and The Sun. Hoover lives in Tennessee and teaches creative writing at Tennessee Tech University. She curates and hosts a poetry reading series, Sawmill Poetry, and produces the “Not Abandon, but Abide” monthly interview series for the Southern Review of Books. Her most recent collection of poems can be found within her latest release, NO SPARE PEOPLE.
Learn more at erinhooverpoet.com
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Gareth Russell is a historian and broadcaster, educated at Oxford University and Queen’s University, Belfast. He is the author of nine books. He is host of the podcast Single Malt History with Gareth Russell. Russell divides his time between London and Belfast, Northern Ireland.
In THE PALACE, Russell presents 500 years of the British monarchy, from King Henry VIII to Queen Elizabeth II, through a unique lens--their connections to specific rooms at Hampton Court Palace. Architecturally breathtaking and rich in splendid art and décor, Hampton Court Palace has been the stage of some of the most important events in British history, such as the commissioning of King James’s translation of the Bible, the staging of many of Shakespeare’s plays, and Queen Elizabeth II’s coronation ball.
Learn more at: https://www.simonandschuster.com/authors/Gareth-Russell/500660891
Follow Gareth at Instagram: @_garethrussell; Twitter: @garethrussell1.
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Molly Harper is the author of more than thirty paranormal and contemporary romance titles, including the Half-Moon Hollow series, the Southern Eclectic series, and the Audible exclusive Mystic Bayou series. Molly lives in Michigan with her family.
Molly's latest novel is Witches Get Stuff Done, an Audible Original.
Learn more at mollyharper.com
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Jacquelyn Mitchard is the New York Times bestselling author of 23 novels for adults and teenagers, and the recipient of Great Britain’s Talkabout prize, The Bram Stoker and Shirley Jackson awards, and named to the short list for the Women’s Prize for Fiction. Her first novel, The Deep End of the Ocean, was the inaugural selection of the Oprah Winfrey Book Club, with more than 3 million copies in print in 34 languages. It was later adapted into a major feature film starring Michelle Pfeiffer. Her novel Still Summer has also been adapted for a film still in production and her teen trilogy The Midnight Twins, is in development for a limited series by Kaleidoscope Entertainment. Her essay collection, The Rest of Us: Dispatches from the Mother Ship, was drawn from her newspaper column syndicated by Tribune Media. Mitchard’s essays also have been published in magazines worldwide, widely anthologized, and incorporated into school curricula. She served on the Fiction jury for the 2003 National Book Awards and was editor-in-chief of Merit Press, a Young Adult imprint under the aegis of Simon and Schuster.
A Chicago native, Mitchard grew up the daughter of a plumber and a hardware store clerk who met as rodeo riders. She is a Distinguished Fellow at the Ragdale Foundation and a DeWitt Clinton Readers Digest Fellow at the MacDowell Colony. She has taught in MFA program for Creative Writing at Vermont College of Fine Arts, Miami University of Ohio and Western New England University and was a speechwriter for former U.S. Rep. and Secretary of Health and Human Services Donna E. Shalala. An avid Italian cook, she lives on Cape Cod with her husband and their nine children. Her newest novel, A Very Inconvenient Scandal, the story of Frankie Attleboro, an acclaimed young underwater photographer reeling from her mother’s shocking death, whose famous marine biologist father shatters the family by marrying Frankie’s best friend, is out from Mira/HarperCollins.
Learn more at jacquelynmitchard.com
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Rochelle B. Weinstein is the USA Today and Amazon bestselling author of When We Let Go, This Is Not How It Ends, Somebody’s Daughter, Where We Fall, The Mourning After, and What We Leave Behind. Rochelle spent her early years, always with a book in hand, raised by the likes of Sidney Sheldon and Judy Blume. A former entertainment industry executive, she splits her time between sunny South Florida and the mountains of North Carolina. When she’s not writing, Rochelle can be found on Miami's NBC 6 in the Mix sharing book recommendations, teaching workshops at Nova Southeastern University, hiking, reading, and finding the world’s best nachos. Her latest novel is What You Do to Me.
Learn more at Rochelleweinstein.com
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Vanessa Riley is the award-winning author of Island Queen, a Good Morning America Buzz Pick. Riley's historical novels showcase the hidden histories of Black women and women of color, emphasizing strong sisterhoods and dazzling multicultural communities. Her works encompass historical fiction, historical romance, and historical mystery and have been reviewed by the Washington Post, Entertainment Weekly, NPR, Publishers Weekly, and the New York Times. This Southern, Irish, Trini girl holds a doctorate in mechanical engineering and an MS in industrial engineering and engineering management from Stanford University. Riley also earned a BS and MS in mechanical engineering from Penn State University. Her research skills have helped NASA, GM, Hewlett Packard, and several startups. Yet, her love of history (Caribbean, Georgian, and Regency) and lattes overwhelmed her passion for math and has led to the publication of over twenty titles. Vanessa is a member and former president of Regency Fiction Writers, a member of Georgia Writers Association, the Historical Novel Society, Crime Writers of Color, and on the Board of Directors of Christian Book Lovers Retreat. She's an avid baker who loves creating her Trinidadian grandma's cake recipes. You can find Vanessa writing on her southern porch with proper amounts of caffeine. Her latest novel, the second in the Lady Worthing Mystery Series, is Murder on Drury Lane.
To learn more please visit www.vanessariley.com
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Emily Bleeker is the best-selling author of six novels. Combined, her books have reached over 1.5 million readers. She is a two-time Whitney Award finalist, a Wall Street Journal bestseller, Amazon charts bestseller and was recently listed as one of the top 100 Kindle authors “of all time.” Emily lives in the northern suburbs of Chicago with her four kids and a growing menagerie of animals. Between writing and being a mom, she attempts to learn guitar, sings along to the radio (loudly), performs with a local improv troupe, and embraces her newfound addiction to running. Her latest novel is When We Were Enemies.
Learn more at: EmilyBleeker.com
Facebook: /emilybleekerauthor
Twitter: @Emily_Bleeker
Instagram: @emilybleekerauthor
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Carolyn Hays is an award-winning, critically acclaimed, bestselling author who has chosen to publish Letter to My Transgender Daughter under a pen name to protect the privacy of her family. Her novels have been published by Hachette, Simon and Schuster, and HarperCollins; her books are also widely translated. Letter to My Transgender Daughter has four overseas editions, including those by Picador UK and Flammarion in France. Her past books have been listed as New York Times Notable Books of the Year and Kirkus’s Best Fiction of the Year, and she's written for National Public Radio and The Washington Post.
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Yasmin Angoe is the author of Her Name Is Knight and a first-generation
Ghanaian American currently residing in South Carolina with her family.
She’s served in education for nearly twenty years and works as a
developmental editor. Yasmin received the 2020 Eleanor Taylor Bland
Crime Fiction Writers of Color Award from Sisters in Crime and is a
member of numerous crime, mystery, and thriller organizations like
Sisters in Crime, Crime Writers of Color, and International Thriller
Writers.
Follow Yasmin at www.yasminangoe.com
Twitter: @yasawriter
Instagram: @author_yas.
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Alison Greenberg is an author and screenwriter who lives in Atlanta, but is quick to say she was born in New York City. While attending The University of Southern California, Alison took her first screenwriting class and fell head over heels. A journey from screenwriting led to marketing jobs, before coming full-circle back to her first love. Alison speaks fluent rom-com, lives for 90’s WB dramas, cries to Taylor Swift, and is a proud single mom to her two incredible kids, two cats, and one poorly-trained dog.
Learn more at: AlisonRoseGreenberg.com
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David R. Slayton grew up in Guthrie, Oklahoma, where finding fantasy novels was pretty challenging and finding fantasy novels with diverse characters was downright impossible. Now he lives in Denver, Colorado and writes the books he always wanted to read. White Trash Warlock, David’s first novel, was a finalist for the Colorado Book Award. In 2015, David founded Trick or Read, an annual initiative to give out books along with candy to children on Halloween as well as uplift lesser-known authors or those from marginalized backgrounds. His latest, Dark Moon, Shallow Sea is the perfect dark fantasy read for Halloween.
Find him online at DavidRSlayton.com
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Virginia Pye’s collection, Shelf Life of Happiness, won the 2019 IPPY Gold Medal for Short Fiction. Her novels, River of Dust and Dreams of the Red Phoenix, have also received literary awards. Her short story collection, Shelf Life of Happiness, (Press 53) won the 2019 Independent Publisher Gold Medal for Short Fiction, and one of its stories was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Her essays have appeared in Literary Hub, New York Times, The Rumpus, Huffington Postand elsewhere. Virginia graduated from Wesleyan University and holds an MFA from Sarah Lawrence College. She has been a Tin House Summer Workshop Scholar, an assistant at the Virginia Quarterly Review Conference, and a repeat fellow at the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts.She’s taught at New York University and the University of Pennsylvania and most recently at GrubStreet in Boston. Her latest novel is The Literary Undoing of Victoria Swann.
Learn more at https://www.virginiapye.com
Special thanks to NetGalley for a preview of this novel.
@netgalley
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Leah Redmond Chang writes biography and literary non-fiction, with a focus on women’s history. Trained as a literature scholar, her books draw on her extensive research in the archives and in rare book libraries. A former tenured professor of French Literature and Culture at The George Washington University, she has also been an Honorary Senior Research Associate at University College London. She lives with her husband and three children in Washington DC, and spends as much time as possible in London, her favorite city.
Learn more at leahredmondchang.com
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Christine Wells writes historical fiction featuring strong, fascinating women. From early childhood, she drank in her father’s tales about the true stories behind popular nursery rhymes and she has been a keen student of history ever since. After graduating from university with a law degree, Christine worked in a large city firm, specializing in corporate mergers and acquisitions. She might still be a lawyer if she hadn’t accepted a challenge from her friend to try her hand at a novel. The minute she began to weave that story, she fell in love with writing fiction. Christine has gone on to publish sixteen novels set in periods ranging from Georgian England to post World War II France. Christine loves dogs, running, holidays at the beach, and window-shopping for antiques. She lives with her family in Brisbane, Australia. Her latest novel is: The Royal Windsor Secret.
To learn more: Christine-wells.com
@ChristineWells0
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Janie Paul is a painter, curator, and writer. She is the senior curator and co-founder, with her late husband Buzz Alexander, of the Exhibitions of Artists in Michigan Prisons, a project of the Prison Creative Arts Project (PCAP). She is Arthur F. Thurnau professor
emerita at the Stamps School of Art & Design at the University of Michigan where she has won many awards for her art and social justice work with incarcerated people and children experiencing poverty. She lives in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Making Art in Prison reveals—through the eyes of the artists who have lived through it—what mass incarceration looks and feels like in the United States. It reveals the ways in which they keep their humanity intact; it invites us to reflect on our own humanity and the problem of living in a country that incarcerates more of its population than any other nation in the world. It also invites us to look closely at the images and appreciate the richness of life and luminosity emerging from the darkest corner of our country.
For more information visit janiepaul.com
The Prison Creative Arts Project:
Twitter / X: @umichPCAP
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Entrepreneur and fitness guru Erin Baker was inspired by a mid-pandemic conversation with her mother-in-law about Baker’s daughter, Arden’s fascination with nail polish. Without delay, this busy mom went to work, not stopping until she’d created a product that could be shared with other young people, My Little Nail Salon.
Learn more at; www.mylittlenailsalon.com
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Sierra Godfrey is the author of A Very Typical Family and The Second Chance Hotel (Sourcebooks). She was born in Santa Cruz, California and has lived many places, including Santorini, Greece. She loves hiking, watching soothing British farmland shows, and thinking of stories about messy families. She lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with her family, which includes a dog, two cats, and a turtle, all of which seemed like a good idea at the time.
Email: sierra@sierragodfrey.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/sierragodfrey
Instagram: https://instagram.com/sierragodfrey
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Sierragodfrey/
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/sierragodfrey
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Carol Dunbar has been writing books since kindergarten and worked freelance as a ghostwriter on her path to becoming a novelist. In 2018 she won the Hal Prize for fiction and her stories have appeared in The New York Times, The South Carolina Review, Midwest Review, and others. Her essays about living off the grid can be heard on Wisconsin Public Radio; one essay, involving her encounter with a mother bear, was televised as an animated short. Before devoting herself to writing, Carol earned her BFA in theatre and worked as a professional actor based out of Minneapolis. The daughter of a naval officer, Carol was born on the island of Guam and bounced around to different schools across the globe growing up. She moved to the Midwest for love, married a Minnesota boy, and never left. She writes from a solar-powered office on the second floor of a water tower in the woods of northern Wisconsin where she lives with her husband, two kids, and a giant Alaskan malamute.
Her debut novel, The Net Beneath Us, recently released in paperback, and A Winter's Rime comes out this fall.
Learn more at https://www.Caroldunbar.com
This episode features clips from recent interviews with:
Philippa Gregory
Meredith Ireland
Anthony Tchaikovsky
Gin Phillips
Elizabeth Winthrop Alsop
Namrata Patel
Hannah Dolby
Piper Hugely
CeCe Lyra, Literary Agent
Steve Phillips
Ciera Horton McElroy
Ashley Winstead
Sariah Wilson
Ret'd. Captain Brett Crozier
Amina Aktar
Kelly J. Ford
Kelly Farmer
Allison Winn Scotch
The Writing Table is taking some time off in August, but Kris and her team will be back in September with more fascinating conversations with authors and publishing pros. Until then, wishing you and yours the safest, kindest, and happiest summer adventures.
Lindsay Cameron worked as a corporate lawyer for many years in Vancouver and New York City before leaving the law behind to write books. Her debut, Biglaw, was optioned for film by Paramount and named a best book of the year by Good Housekeeping, Redbook, and Harper's Bazaar, among others. Her suspense debut, Just One Look, was published in 2021 and the New York Times called it "delicious and marvelously controlled...a wild ride of a novel" and "one of the most viscerally accurate renderings of cooperate law in recent fiction." Her latest thriller, No One Needs to Know, **hit the shelves on May 9,2023.
Lindsay lives in New York City where she is currently at work on her next book.
Connect with Lindsay:
www.lindsayjcameron.com
Twitter: @lindsayjcameron
FB: /lindsayjcameron
IG: @lindsaycameronauthor**
Kelly J. Ford is the author of the crime novels, Real Bad Things and Cottonmouths, which has “impressive depths of character and setting,” according to the Los Angeles Review, which named it one of its Best Books of 2017. An Arkansas native, Kelly writes crime fiction set in the Ozarks and Arkansas River Valley. She currently lives on Cape Cod.
Learn more about Kelly here:
Website: https://kellyjford.com/
Instagram: @kellyjfordauthor
Twitter: @Kelly_J_Ford
USA Today bestselling author Annie Rains lives in a small, coastal North Carolina town, full of lovable folks, scenic downtown areas, and breathtaking nature—similar to the towns she writes about in her books. Annie’s love of reading and writing grabbed hold of her at a young age and never let go. Her first book was published in 2015, and she’s been writing heartfelt, page-turning stories ever since. When Annie isn’t writing, she’s reading from her never-ending TBR stack on her bedside table, taking long walks while plotting her characters’ happy endings, and living out her own happily ever after with her husband, three children, feisty rescue cat, and mischievous dog.
You can find Annie online at www.annierains.com or on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram at @annierainsbooks
Donna Hill began her career in 1987 writing short stories for the confession magazines. Since that time she has more than 100 published titles to her credit since her first novel was released in 1990, and is considered one of the early pioneers of the African American romance genre. Three of her novels Intimate Betrayal, Masquerade and A Private Affair have been adapted for television. The only Arabesque /BET Books author that can claim that distinction. She has been featured in Essence, the New York Daily News, USA Today, Today’s Black Woman, and Black Enterprise among many others. She has appeared on numerous radio and television stations across the country and her work has appeared on several bestseller lists. She has received numerous awards for her body of work—which cross several genres– including The Career Achievement Award, the first recipient of The Trailblazer Award, The Zora Neale Hurston Literary Award, The Gold Pen Award among others, as well as commendations for her community service, during her tenure as Coordinator for Kianga House—a transitional residence for homeless teen mothers and their children. Donna co-wrote the screenplay Fire, which enjoyed limited theater release before going to DVD.
As an editor she has packaged several highly successful novels, and anthologies, two of which were nominated for awards. She began her ‘teaching” career as a writing instructor at The Frederick Douglass Creative Arts Center in New York in the early 90s. Several of her students have gone on to publish novels. Donna also served as a writing instructor with the Elders Writing Program sponsored by Medgar Evers College through Poets & Writers, and successfully worked to compile and publish the memoirs of the elders. While Donna may not be recognized on national bestsellers lists, she has maintained a solid 30-year writing career, supported by her devoted fans, which she celebrated in June 2020 in commemoration of the release of her first novel Rooms of the Heart.
Donna holds an MFA in Creative Writing from Goddard College, and is in pursuit of her D.A. degree from Murray State University in English Pedagogy and Technology. She is an Assistant Professor of Professional Writing at Medgar Evers College, and former Adjunct Instructor at Baruch College, Essex County College and the College of New Rochelle. Donna currently lives in Brooklyn with her family.
Variety just announced that Amblin Partners has secured the film rights to Donna Hill's Confessions in B-Flat (published in 2020), with Academy Award-winning actor and producer Octavia Spencer, four-time Oscar-nominated producer Kristie Macosko Krieger and Aimee Carpenter set to produce.
Learn more at:
Donna's website: https://donnaohill.com
Confessions in B-Flat: https://variety.com/2023/film/news/confessions-in-b-flat-octavia-spencer-kristie-macosko-krieger-amblin-partners-1235547697/
https://twitter.com/donnahill
https://www.facebook.com/donnahillwriter
https://www.entangledpublishing.com/books/i-am-ayah-the-way-home
When she was eleven years old, Bryn Turnbull accidentally put her foot through a single-pane window while leafing through a well-worn copy of Sandman
(Volume 2). The incident, which resulted in a trip to the hospital, five stitches, and a unique application of superglue, taught her two things: one, that reading is not,
and should not be attempted as, a full-contact sport; and two, that writers can create worlds within a book so absorbing, so completely and utterly all-encompassing, that
they can drive readers to such distraction as to forget the outside world entirely.
Today, Bryn is a writer of historical fiction. Her debut novel, The Woman Before Wallis, was named one of the top ten bestselling works of Canadian fiction for 2020 and became an international bestseller. Her second, The Last Grand Duchess, came out in February 2022 and spent eight weeks on the Globe & Mail and Toronto Star bestseller lists. Equipped with a Master of Letters in Creative Writing from the University of St. Andrews, a Master of Professional Communication from Toronto Metropolitan University (formerly Ryerson University), and a Bachelor’s degree in English Literature from McGill University, Bryn, who resides in Toronto, writes books intended to drive readers to similar levels of distraction – to transport them into different eras and different worlds, but hopefully not into the hospital.
Learn more at BrynTurnbull.com
Twitter: @brynturnbull
FB and IG: @brynturnbullwrites
Namrata Patel is an Indian-American author who lives in Boston. Her writing examines diaspora, dual-cultural identity among Indian-Americans and explores this dynamic while also touching on both—the family’s we’re born with and those we choose. Namrata has lived in India, Spokane, London, and New York City. Namrata has been writing for most of her adult life and loves creating characters who are relatable and aspirational. Her heroines range from quiet to kick-ass and her heroes are swoon-worthy, if a little flawed. Her novel The Candid Life of Meena Dave is currently long listed for Best First Novel Prize by The Center for Fiction. Her second novel isThe Scent of a Garden .
Hannah Dolby’s first job was in the circus and she has aimed to keep life as interesting since. She trained as a journalist in Hastings and has worked in PR for many years, promoting museums, galleries, palaces, gardens and even Dolly the sheep.
She completed the Curtis Brown selective three-month novel writing course, and she won runner-up in the Comedy Women in Print Awards for this novel with the prize of a place on an MA in Comedy Writing at the University of Falmouth.
She lives in London and her debut novel is No Life for a Lady.
Learn more by following Hannah here:
Twitter: @LadyDolby
Instagram: Dolby_Hannah
ADRIAN TCHAIKOVSKY was born in Lincolnshire and studied zoology and psychology at Reading, before practising law in Leeds. He is a keen live role-player and occasional amateur actor and is trained in stage-fighting. His literary influences include Gene Wolfe, Mervyn Peake, China Miéville, Mary Gently, Steven Erikson, Naomi Novak, Scott Lynch and Alan Campbell.
Learn more at: adriantchaikovsky.com
Cecilia “CeCe” Lyra is a literary agent at P.S. Literary Agency representing adult fiction and non-fiction. She is drawn to books with strong hooks and smooth writing, told with originality, nuance, and authenticity. A long-term strategic thinker, CeCe prioritizes the creative reach and sustainable longevity of her authors’ careers, and she is especially looking for clients with whom she can build fruitful, lasting relationships. Both a storyteller and a storyseller, CeCe believes that stories are empathy-generating machines capable of healing, connecting, and enacting true change. As a mixed race Latinx immigrant, CeCe understands the power of seeing oneself reflected in books, hence her passion for championing under or misrepresented voices and narratives that contribute to a larger cultural conversation. The popular podcast The Shit No One Tells You About Writing, for which CeCe is a co-host, has over one million downloads. CeCe is also a recovering lawyer but asks that you do not hold that against her. When she isn’t living inside a story, CeCe can be found drinking wine, munching on chocolate, and snuggling with her adorable English Bulldog.
Learn more: cecilialyra.com or psliterary.com.
The Shit No One Tells You About Writing podcast
Twitter: @TSNOTYAW @BiancaM_author @carlywatters @ceciliaclyra
Facebook: @tsnotyaw
Websites: www.theshitaboutwriting.com, www.biancamarais.com, www.carlywatters.com, and www.cecilialyra.com
Brett Crozier grew up in California, graduated from the United States Naval Academy, and embarked on a thirty-year career in the Navy, flying dozens of combat missions over Iraq and leading at the highest levels of operational command. He served as the commanding officer of a combat F/A-18 strike fighter squadron, the world’s largest and most advanced communications ship, and ultimately the USS Theodore Roosevelt before retiring from the Navy in 2022. Surf When You Can is his first book. Please visit: https://surfwhenyoucan.com/
2019 Navy feature on Brett Crosier: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87EEPZ5mf1A&authuser=1
Brett's Retirement Ceremony: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R0-xkk-ooxk&t=7s&authuser=1
Ashley Winstead’s 2021 breakout thriller, In My Dreams I Hold a Knife, was an Amazon Editor’s Best Thriller, an Apple Books Best Book of August, as well as a Library Journal, New York Times, CrimeReads, Parade, and Goodreads best or most anticipated thriller of the year.
Her 2022 thriller, The Last Housewife, was a Library Reads pick, a Loan Star pick, an Amazon Editor’s Best Thriller, as well as a Cosmopolitan, Good Morning America, Good Housekeeping, Seattle Times, and Southern Review of Fiction best or most anticipated thriller of the year. Her 2022 romance debut, Fool Me Once, was an Amazon Editor’s Best Romance as well as a USA Today, PopSugar, New York Post, and Goodreads best or most anticipated romance of the year.
Her work has been translated into a dozen languages and optioned for film/television. Ashley holds a Ph.D. in contemporary American literature and lives in Houston, TX.
Learn more at: ashleywinstead.com
Meredith Ireland is a Korean American attorney and writer, born in Seoul. She is a Rollins College and University of Miami School of Law alumna. She writes young adult and children’s books and is proudly represented by Lauren Spieller of Folio Literary Agency. Her debut novel, THE JASMINE PROJECT, was a Junior Library Guild Gold Standard selection, a Best Book of 2021 according to Boston Public Library, and received a starred review from Booklist. Her follow up, EVERYONE HATES KELSIE MILLER, also from Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, was named a best book of 2022 by both Forbes and Seventeen Magazine. Her short story was featured in YOU ARE HERE, a middle grade anthology and the inaugural title from Allida/Clarion, which received six starred reviews. She will also have a short story in WHEN WE BECAME OURS, a YA anthology coming October 2023, edited by Nicole Chung. EMMA & THE LOVE SPELL, her debut middle grade fantasy will be out in January 2024 from Bloomsbury Children’s Publishing.
Meredith resides in New York with her two children and a county fair goldfish who will probably outlive them all.
Learn more at here.
Twitter: @MeredithIreland
https://meredithireland.wordpress.com/
Rebecca Keller is a writer, an internationally exhibited artist, a college professor, a Fulbright Scholar, and recipient of awards from the National Endowment for the Arts. But once upon a time she was a house-cleaner, shuttle driver, waitress, and nursing home cook. She got a graduate degree to improve her lot, and ended up working in museums, where she wrote about art and gave tours, making her own work at night. She had children. She began teaching at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She was awarded a Fulbright. She did a TEDx talk.
And she began writing fiction. Her stories have been nominated for a Pushcart prize, and her debut novel "You Should Have Known" will be released from Crooked Lane Books in 2023. She is now working on stories about art and another novel.
Learn more at rebeccakeller.com
Instagram: @rebeccakeller947
Twitter: @keller_reb
Born in California and raised in South Florida, Harper Kincaid has moved around like a nomad with a bounty on her head ever since. She has earned a master’s degree in Gender History and another in Clinical/Macro Social Work. She has published with Samhain, Entangled, Crooked Lane Press, Throat Punch Media, and Medium.
Her latest book is the acclaimed sequel mystery, A Midsummer Night’s Scheme, part of the Book Binder mystery series lauded by Kirkus Review, Publisher’s Weekly, Fresh Fiction, Booklist, and Cozy Mystery Book Review. When not writing, Harper adores watching documentaries, painting & drawing, listening to lo-fi on vinyl, and reading while it’s raining. This is where she’d like to talk/brag about her family, but has been forbidden to do so-under the threat of a court order (as if) and prolonged dirty looks only her grown daughters could deliver. Her husband is staying out of it. The dogs just want to chew on our underwear.
Learn more at harperkincaid.com
Follow Harper on Instagram @harperkincaid
*Nancy Crochiere wrote a humor column about family life for Massachusetts newspapers for thirteen years. Her collection of those columns, titled The Mother Load, was a finalist for Foreword Reviews’ Book of the Year in humor and the Independent Publishers of New England 2014 Book Award. A graduate of Middlebury College, she earned a master’s degree in English Language and Literature from the University of Minnesota, is an alumna of GrubStreet’s Novel Incubator program, and worked as a development editor for various educational publishers. Her essays have appeared in The Boston Globe, Writer’s Digest, and WBUR’s Cognoscenti blog. She began her fiction career when her daughters were young by penning creative notes to excuse their tardiness at school. With her girls now grown, she lives north of Boston with her husband, a lawyer and marathoner, and a few house plants that could use more attention. Graceland is her first novel.
“Graceland is a sparkling, warm-hearted, witty debut. I so enjoyed joining these three generations of women on their action-packed road trip to Memphis!” — Liane Moriarty, #1 New York Times bestselling author*
Learn more at nancycrochiere.com
Ciera Horton McElroy was raised in Orlando, Florida. She holds a BA from Wheaton College and an MFA from the University of Central Florida. Her work has appeared in AGNI, Bridge Eight, Iron Horse Literary Review, The Crab Orchard Review, and Saw Palm, among others. She currently lives in St. Louis with her husband and son.
Learn more at cieramcelroy.com
Alisa Lynn Valdés is a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author with more than 1 million books in print in 11 languages. She started her writing career as an award-winning staff writer for The Boston Globe and The Los Angeles Times.
Alisa holds a bachelor's degree in music from Berklee College of Music in Boston, where she majored in jazz performance on the tenor saxophone. Her master's in journalism comes from Columbia University in New York City.
For twenty years, Alisa was a fitness professional, an educator for the Aerobics and Fitness Association of America. After 15 years away from her native New Mexico, Alisa returned, to write novels. When she's not writing, Alisa enjoys hiking, camping, fly fishing, kayaking and photography. A deeply spiritual person, Alisa was raised as an atheist but changed her view after a profound near-death experience in which she crossed over for a while.
Alisa once owned her own boutique scone bakery and is now working on her keto and paleo baking skills. She's a volunteer with New Mexico Volunteers for the Outdoors. If she got to start over again, she'd choose to be a game warden instead of a writer. So now she's doing the next best thing, and writing novels about Jodi Luna, a fictional New Mexico game warden. HOLLOW BEASTS is out now!
Learn more at: https://www.alisa-valdes-rodriguez.com/
Lexie Elliott has been writing for as long as she can remember, but she began to focus on it more seriously after she lost her banking job in 2009 due to the Global Financial Crisis. After some success in short story competitions, she began planning a novel. With two kids and a (new) job, it took some time for that novel to move from her head to the page, but the result was The French Girl, which was published by Berkley in February 2018 - available on Amazon now! This was followed by The Missing Years in 2019 and How To Kill Your Best Friend in 2021. She is now working on her fourth novel.
When she's not writing, Lexie can be found running, swimming or cycling whilst thinking about writing. In 2007 she swam the English Channel solo. She won't be doing that again. In 2015 she ran 100km, raising money for Alzheimer Scotland. She won't be doing that again either. But the odd triathlon or marathon isn't out of the question. Lexie's latest novel is Bright and Deadly Things.
Learn more at: www.lexieelliott.comwww.facebook.com/lexieelliottwrites
Allison Winn Scotch is the bestselling author of nine novels (tenth on its way), including BETWEEN ME AND YOU, IN TWENTY YEARS, TIME OF MY LIFE, which is currently in development at Sony Pictures, and THE REWIND. Allison graduated cum laude from the University of Pennsylvania with a BA in Honors History and Concentration in Marketing from the Wharton School of Business.
When she’s not planted in front of the computer, she’s hiking, running, doing yoga, reading, listening to music, negotiating with her teenagers, or hanging out in Los Angeles with her family and their pooches, Hugo and Mr. Peanut.
Learn more at www.allisonwinn.com
Elizabeth Shick is an award-winning novelist whose creativity is influenced by her many years living abroad, including six years in Myanmar. Originally from Newton, Massachusetts, she grew up dreaming of other worlds, both real and imagined.
As an Africana Studies major at Vassar College, Liz spent a transformative year at the University of Dar es Salaam in Tanzania studying Literature and Revolution, Imperialism and Liberation, and African Wood Carving. She went on to obtain a Master of International Affairs in Economic and Political Development and a Certificate of African Studies from Columbia University.
Liz has since worked for a variety of international development organizations and humanitarian agencies in Angola, Italy, Malawi, Mozambique, Myanmar, Tanzania, and The Gambia. Along the way, she met and married her Italian-Australian husband and raised two wonderful and worldly daughters and three well-traveled cats.
An avid reader of literature from around the world, Liz started writing fiction in 2005 and has been scribbling away ever since. In 2019, she received her MFA in Creative Writing from Lesley University. Her debut novel, The Golden Land, is the winner of the 2021 AWP Prize for the Novel.
Liz and her husband now live in Dhaka, Bangladesh, returning to West Tisbury, Massachusetts as often as possible.
Learn more at elizabethshick.com
After being born and raised in the suburbs of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Lauren Thoman eventually moved with her husband to live outside of Nashville, Tennessee.
Although her degree was in music education, Lauren quickly realized that the life of a band director was not for her. After exploring various other fields for a few years, she started working on her first novel when her second child started preschool. However, those early manuscripts never made it all the way to publication, and after a few years, Lauren decided to try her hand at pop culture writing, combining her passion for writing with her lifetime love of watching and analyzing movies and TV shows.
It didn’t take long for Lauren to become a frequent contributor to a number of prominent online pop culture outlets, such as Parade, Vulture, POPSUGAR, Looper, and Collider, leaving little time for writing books. For a few years, Lauren took a break from creative writing as she focused more on freelancing, enjoying the opportunity to get her writing in front of a wider community of readers. (Including The Rock. Three. Times.)
Eventually, though, in between article deadlines, she managed to finish another book, one that she’d started years before and then set aside. She called it I'LL STOP THE WORLD. And a few months later, much to her delighted surprise, Mindy Kaling decided to publish it.
Lauren still lives outside of Nashville with her husband and two children in a chaotic household that also includes an assortment of rescue and foster dogs and an ever-increasing quantity of fish. When she's not writing, she's probably on the hunt for tacos or coffee, or buried underneath a pile of dogs.
Tracy Clark, a native Chicagoan, is the author of the Cass Raines Chicago Mystery series, featuring ex-cop turned PaI Cassandra Raines. Her debut, BROKEN PLACES, made Library Journal’s list of the Best Crime Fiction of 2018 and CrimeReads named Cass Raines Best New PI of 2018. The novel was nominated for a Lefty Award for Best Debut Novel, an Anthony Award for Best Debut Novel and a Shamus Award for Best First PI Novel. Her second Raines novel, BORROWED TIME, was a finalist for the 2020 Lefty Award for Best Mystery Novel and won the 2020 G.P. Putnam’s Sons Sue Grafton Memorial Award. Book three in the Raines series, WHAT YOU DON’T SEE, was also short-listed for the 2021 Left Award for Best Mystery novel. Book four, RUNNER, releases June 29, 2021. Tracy, a proud member of Sisters in Crime and Mystery Writers of America, is a lifelong South-Sider and roots for every Chicago team with equal enthusiasm. She is currently busy writing her next book.
More at https://tracyclarkbooks.com
Elle Marr is the author of thrillers THE MISSING SISTER (2020), LIES WE BURY (2021), STRANGERS WE KNOW (2022), and THE FAMILY BONES (2023). She is (evidently) a fan of coffee.
THE MISSING SISTER was a #1 Amazon bestseller and an Amazon Charts bestseller, while LIES WE BURY earned a Kirkus starred review, and STRANGERS WE KNOW was an Audible Most Anticipated Thriller. Publishers Weekly gave a starred review to THE FAMILY BONES, saying “Readers will be captivated from the very first page.”
Originally from Sacramento, Elle Marr graduated from UC San Diego before moving to France, where she earned a master’s degree from the Sorbonne University in Paris. When not working on her next book, she enjoys watching French Netflix shows with the subtitles off, in Oregon, where she lives with her family.
Learn more at ElleMarr.com.
USA Today Bestselling author Sariah Wilson has never jumped out of an airplane, never climbed Mt. Everest, and is not a former CIA operative. She has, however, been madly, passionately in love with her soulmate and is a fervent believer in happily ever afters—which is why she writes romance. She grew up in southern California, graduated from Brigham Young University (go Cougars!) with a semi-useless degree in history, and is the oldest of nine (yes, nine) children. She currently lives with the aforementioned soulmate and their children in Utah, along with cats named Pixel, Callie, and Belle who do not get along. (The cats, not the children. Although the children sometimes have their issues, too.)
Learn more at sariahwilson.com.
CHRIS PALMER has spent twenty years as a journalist writing about the intersection of entertainment, culture, and sports for ESPN, Bleacher Report, and other outlets. An authority on all things Fresh Prince, he has authored six books, including the New York Times bestsellers WIDE
OPEN, the autobiography of Supercross Champion Jeremy McGrath, and Laker great Lamar Odom’s memoir, DARKNESS TO LIGHT.
Kelly Farmer (she/her) has been writing romance novels since junior high. In those days, they featured high school quarterbacks named Brad who drove Corvettes and gals with names like Desireé because her own name is rather plain. Her stories since then have ranged from historical and contemporary male/female romances to light women’s fiction to LGBTQ+ romance. One theme remains the same: everyone deserves to have a happy ending.
When not writing, she enjoys being outside in nature, quoting from Eighties movies, listening to all kinds of music, and petting every dog she comes in contact with. All of these show up in her books. She also watches a lot of documentaries to satisfy her hunger for random bits of trivia. Kelly lives in the Chicago area, where she swears every winter is her last one there.
To connect with Kelly, talk about current TV binges, and subscribe to her newsletter for access to FREE bonus stories in the Out on the Ice Series, please head over to:
https://www.kellyfarmerauthor.com/
https://www.facebook.com/kellyfarmerauthor
https://twitter.com/KellyFarmerAuth
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/20094508.Kelly_Farmer
Melissa Payne is the bestselling, award-winning author of The Secrets of Lost Stones and Memories in the Drift. For as long as she can remember, Melissa has been telling stories in one form or another—from high school newspaper articles to a graduate thesis to blogging about marriage and motherhood. But she first learned the real importance of storytelling when she worked for a residential and day treatment center for abused and neglected children. There she wrote speeches and letters to raise funds for the children. The truth in those stories was piercing and painful and written to invoke a call to action in the reader: to give, to help, to make a difference. Melissa’s love of writing and sharing stories in all forms has endured. She lives in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains with her husband and three children, a friendly mutt, a very loud cat, and the occasional bear.
Learn more at www.melissapayneauthor.com.
Burt Weissbourd is a novelist, screenwriter, and producer of feature films. He was born in 1949 and graduated cum laude from Yale University, with honors in psychology. During his student years, he volunteered at the Museum of Modern Art in Paris and taught English to college students in Thailand. After he graduated, he wrote, directed, and produced educational films for Gilbert Altschul Productions. He began a finance program at the Northwestern University Graduate School of Business but left in his final semester to start his own film production company in Los Angeles. He managed that company from 1977 until 1986, producing films including Ghost Story starring Fred Astaire, Melvyn Douglas, John Houseman, and Douglas Fairbanks Jr, and Raggedy Man starring Sissy Spacek and Sam Shepard, which The New York Times called "a movie of sweet, low-keyed charm." In 1987, he founded an investment business, which he still runs. Burt’s novels include the thrillers Danger in Plain Sight, The Corey Logan Trilogy (Inside Passage, Teaser and Minos), and In Velvet, which is set in Yellowstone National Park. Rough Justice, the sequel to Danger in Plain Sight, is out now.
For more visit, burtweissbourd.com.
Megan Frampton writes historical romance under her own name and romantic women's fiction as Megan Caldwell. She likes the color black, gin, dark-haired British men, and huge earrings, not in that order. She lives in Brooklyn, New York, with her husband and kid.
You can find her at meganframpton.com at facebook.com/meganframptonbooks/ and @meganf.
Lisa has been a paparazzi photographer, an aid worker in Kenya, a script doctor in LA, and a literary publicist at HarperCollins in Toronto. Her stories have been published in The Virginia Quarterly Review, Ploughshares, Narrative, The Idaho Review, and others. She holds a BA in Philosophy from The University of Western Ontario, a graduate degree in Portrait Photography from The London Institute, and an MFA from the University of Memphis. She has lived all over the world, but currently resides in Southern California, where she teaches fiction writing at Chapman University.
Learn more at lisacupolo.com.
Tori Whitaker is the bestselling author of Millicent Glenn’s Last Wish and A Matter of Happiness. She belongs to the Bourbon Women Association and the Historical Novel Society. Her work has appeared in the Historical Novels Review and Bookmarks magazine. Tori graduated from Indiana University, is an alum of the Yale Writers’ Workshop, and is recently retired from a national law firm where she served as chief marketing officer. She spent a decade in Detroit because of her husband’s career in the automotive industry. The two now reside near their children outside Atlanta and have been married for forty-five happy years.
Connect with Tori through www.toriwhitaker.com.
Corie Adjmi is the author of the short story collection Life and Other Shortcomings, which won an International Book Award, an IBPA Benjamin Franklin award, and an American Fiction Award. Her prize-winning essays and short stories have appeared in dozens of journals and magazines, including HuffPost, North American Review, Indiana Review, Medium, Motherwell and Kveller. She’s been featured in Travel and Leisure, New York Magazine, The Hollywood Times, Parade and BuzzFeed. Her forthcoming book is a novel titled The Marriage Box, was named a Must-Read New Book of 2022 on Katie Couric Media, and is due out in August 2022. When she is not writing, Corie does volunteer work, cooks, draws, bikes and hikes. She and her husband have five children and a number of grandchildren, with more on the way. She lives and works in New York City.
Learn more at corieadjmi.com.
Henriette Lazaridis' novel TERRA NOVA is forthcoming from Pegasus Books in Fall 2022. She is the author of the best-selling novel THE CLOVER HOUSE. Her short work has appeared or is forthcoming in publications including ELLE, Forge, Narrative Magazine, The New York Times, New England Review, The Millions, and Pangyrus, and has earned her a Massachusetts Cultural Council Artists Grant. Henriette grew up in the Boston area as the only child of Greek expats, speaking Greek as her first language. Devoted to storytelling since her childhood bedtime stories from the Odyssey, Henriette earned degrees in English literature from Middlebury College, Oxford University, where she was a Rhodes Scholar, and the University of Pennsylvania. Having taught English at Harvard, she now teaches at GrubStreet in Boston. She founded The Drum Literary Magazine and currently runs the Krouna Writing Workshop in northern Greece. She writes the Substack newsletter The Entropy Hotel, about athletic and creative challenges at henriettelazaridis.substack.com. F
Learn more at henriettelazaridis.com.
As a child, Elizabeth Winthrop Alsop, along with her five brothers, was raised to revere the tribal legends of the Alsop and Roosevelt families. Her parents’ marriage, lived in the spotlight of 1950s Washington where the author’s father, journalist Stewart Alsop, grew increasingly famous, was not what either of her parents had imagined it would be. Her mother’s strict Catholicism and her father’s restless ambition collided to create a strangely muted and ominous world, one that mirrored the whispered conversations in the living room as the power brokers of Washington came and went through their side door. Through it all, her mother, trained to keep secrets as a decoding agent with MI5, said very little. In this brave memoir, the author explores who her mother was, why alcohol played such an important role in her mother’s life, and why her mother held herself apart from all her children, especially her only daughter. In the author’s journey to understand her parents, particularly her mother, she comes to realize that the secrets parents keep are the ones that reverberate most powerfully in the lives of their children.
Learn more at elizabethwinthropalsop.com
Steve Phillips is a national political leader, bestselling author, and columnist. He is the author of The New York Times bestseller Brown Is the New White: How the Demographic Revolution Has Created a New American Majority and the forthcoming book How We Win the Civil War: Securing a Multiracial Democracy and Ending White Supremacy for Good.
He is a columnist for The Guardian and The Nation, and an opinion contributor to The New York Times. He is also the host of “Democracy in Color with Steve Phillips,” a color-conscious podcast on politics. He is the founder of Democracy in Color, a political media organization dedicated to race, politics and the multicultural progressive New American Majority.
Phillips is a graduate of Stanford University and Hastings College of the Law and practiced civil rights and employment law for many years. Phillips has appeared on multiple national radio and television networks including NBC, CNN, MSNBC and C-SPAN.
Learn more at stevephillips.com
Barbara Linn Probst is an award-winning author of contemporary women’s fiction living on an historic dirt road in New York’s Hudson Valley. Her acclaimed novels QUEEN OF THE OWLS (2020) and THE SOUND BETWEEN THE NOTES (2021) were Gold and Silver medalists for prestigious national awards, and THE SOUND BETWEEN THE NOTES was selected by Kirkus Reviews as one of the Best Indie Books of 2021. Barbara has also published over fifty essays on the craft of writing for sites such as Jane Friedman and Writer Unboxed, along with two nonfiction books. Her third novel THE COLOR OF ICE will be released in October 2022.
Learn more on www.BarbaraLinnProbst.com
MADDIE FROST is an author-illustrator from Massachusetts. She has written and illustrated over several books and is currently working on her debut early reader graphic novel series, WOMBATS! The first book is set to publish Spring 2023. Her obsession with 90’s Nickelodeon cartoons started her love for characters and storytelling and then a love for picture books. She studied Animation at Massachusetts College of Art and Design which further pushed her in the direction of children's media. One day she decided to quit her job to chase a dream of being a full-time author/illustrator. She said yes to small projects, got rejected (a lot), and kept her head above water until that dream finally came true. Maddie is a proud #FunnyFemale in the kid-lit community and champions all female creators in children’s literature. When not making books she can be found with her dogs.
More fun can be had at maddie-frost.com
A born and bred New Yorker and lifelong daydreamer, Meredith Schorr fueled her passion for writing everything from restaurant reviews, original birthday cards, and even work-related emails into a career penning romantic comedies. When she’s not writing books filled with grand gestures and hard-earned happily-ever-afters or working as a trademark paralegal, she’s most often reading, running, or watching TV…for research, of course.
Learn more at Meredithschorr.com
Anthony McGowan is one of the most widely acclaimed young adult and children’s authors in the UK. His books have won numerous major awards. In 2020, he was awarded the CILIP Carnegie Medal for Lark. He was also shortlisted for the Carnegie Medal with Rook and won the Booktrust Teenage Prize and the Catalyst Award for Henry Tumour. His YA novel The Knife that Killed Me was made into a critically-lauded film in 2014. Anthony lives in London, with his wife, two children and dog. Anthony’s latest novel is Dogs of the Deadlands.
Learn more at anthonymcgowan.com
Compulsive tea drinker. Outdoor sports junkie. Lover of good (and bad) puns.
Award-winning adventure romance author Stacy Gold gave up her day job as Communications Director of a nonprofit mountain biking organization to write sassy, steamy, contemporary romance novels. Her stories are packed with strong, independent women finding love and adventure in the great outdoors--think Sarina Bowen or Elle Kennedy but featuring skiing, mountain biking and other outdoor sports.
When Stacy’s not busy reading or writing, you can find her in Boulder, Colorado dancing, laughing or playing hard in the mountains with her wonderful hubby and happy dogs. Learn more, and join the Gold Club for early release news, freebies, contests and more at http://stacygold.com
Gin Phillips has written six novels, and her work has been sold in 29 countries.
Her debut novel, The Well and the Mine, won the 2009 Barnes & Noble Discover Award. Her novel Fierce Kingdom was named one of the Best Crime Novels of 2017 by the New York Times Book Review. It was also named one of the best books of the year by NPR, Publishers Weekly, Amazon, and Kirkus Reviews. A Kirkus starred review called it “poignant and profound,” adding that "this adrenaline-fueled thriller will shatter readers like a bullet through bone.” The New York Times called the novel “expertly made…clever and irresistible,” noting that “Phillips…beautifully captures the quirks, tedium and magic of parenting a young child.”
Gin’s novels also have been named as selections for Indie Next, Book of the Month, and the Junior Library Guild.
Born in Montgomery, Al., Gin graduated from Birmingham-Southern College with a degree in political journalism. After time spent in Ireland, New York, and Washington, D.C., she currently lives with her family (plus a schnoodle and a mini golden mountain doodle) in Birmingham.
Learn more at Ginphillips.com
Gina Panettieri is an literary agent with Talcott Notch Literary who has an affinity for quirky, edgy characters. She represents a variety of genres including women’s fiction, paranormal, urban fantasy, horror, science fiction, historical, mystery, thrillers and suspense. On occasion, Gina participates as an instructor and workshop leader for Writer's Digest.
Founded in 2002, Talcott Notch Literary, is a five-member, full-service literary agency representing the freshest voices in both adult and juvenile fiction and nonfiction. With an impressive list of New York Times, Wall Street Journal, USA Today and #1 Amazon bestsellers as well as a vast array of award-winning fiction and nonfiction, our agents proudly represent the newest rising stars and acclaimed established authors.
Learn more at https://talcottnotch.net
Gary Goldstein is an award-winning writer for film, TV, and the theatre with more than thirty produced screen and stage credits. The New York native and longtime L.A. resident has also been a contributing film reviewer and arts feature writer for the Los Angeles Times since 2007. His first novel, the romantic comedy "The Last Birthday Party," won a 2022 IBPA Benjamin Franklin Award for Excellence in Fiction. His second novel, the family drama "The Mother I Never Had," will be published October 2022 by Hadleigh House.
Learn more about Gary at GaryGoldsteinLA.com
Philippa Gregory is one of the world’s foremost historical novelists. She wrote her first ever novel, Wideacre, when she was completing her PhD in eighteenth-century literature and it sold worldwide, heralding a new era for historical fiction. Her flair for blending history and imagination developed into a signature style and Philippa went on to write many bestselling novels, including The Other Boleyn Girl and The White Queen.
Now a recognised authority on women’s history, Philippa graduated from the University of Sussex and received a PhD from the University of Edinburgh, where she is a Regent and was made Alumna of the Year in 2009. She holds honorary degrees from Teesside University and the University of Sussex. She is a fellow of the Universities of Sussex and Cardiff and an honorary research fellow at Birkbeck University of London.
Philippa is a member of the Society of Authors and in 2016, was presented with the Outstanding Contribution to Historical Fiction Award by the Historical Writers’ Association. In 2018, she was awarded an Honorary Platinum Award by Nielsen for achieving significant lifetime sales across her entire book output. www.PhilippaGregory.com.
Kim Taylor Blakemore writes historical novels that feature fierce, audacious, and often dangerous women. She writes about the thieves and servants, murderesses and mediums, grifters and frauds - the women with darker stories, tangled lies and hidden motives. She is the author of the historical thrillers THE DECEPTION, Silver Falchion Award winner AFTER ALICE FELL, THE COMPANION, and the historical novels BOWERY GIRL, and CISSY FUNK, a WILLA Literary Award winner for Best Young Adult novel.
In addition to writing, she is a developmental editor, and founder of Novelitics, which provides workshops and community to writers in the United States and Canada. She lives with her family and passel of rescue cats and dogs in the Pacific Northwest. She loves the rain, is afraid of scary movies, and thinks the best meal consists of a grilled cheese sandwich and tomato soup.
Learn more at kimtaylorblakemore.com
Louise Marburg studied design at the Kansas City Art Institute, is a graduate of New York University’s Gallatin Division, and holds an MFA in Fiction from Columbia University’s School of the Arts. Her stories have appeared in Narrative, Ploughshares, The Louisville Review, The Carolina Quarterly, The Pinch, The Chicago Quarterly Review, Post Road, and many other publications. A native of Baltimore, she lives in New York City with her husband, the artist Charles Marburg.
Learn more at: Louisemarburg.com
Katie Sise is a bestselling author of six novels. Her books have been included on best-of lists by Good Morning America, The New York Post, PopSugar, Parade Magazine, and PureWow. Her current novel, The Break, is a Zibby's Book Club pick for November. Katie is a former TV host and jewelry designer, and lives outside of New York City with her husband, four children, and a golden retriever who has finally calmed down.
Follow Katie on social media @katiesise, or visit her website www.katiesise.com
Lynne Reeves Griffin is a nationally recognized expert on relationships and family life. Writing as Lynne Reeves, her novel of domestic suspense, The Dangers of an Ordinary Night was described by The New York Times as “a sensitive examination of a dysfunctional family and a full-of-secrets community that claims to be seeking the truth.” Her next novel, Dark Rivers to Cross will be published November 8, 2022.
Lynne is also the author of the acclaimed novels, Girl Sent Away (SixOneSeven Books, 2015), Sea Escape (Simon & Schuster, 2010), and Life Without Summer (St. Martin’s Press, 2009). She’s written the nonfiction guides Let’s Talk About It: Adolescent Mental Health (SixOneSeven Books, 2015) and Negotiation Generation: Take Back Your Parental Authority Without Punishment (Penguin, 2007).
Lynne has taught family studies at the undergraduate and graduate levels, and has acted as the visiting scholar of education at Ngee Ann Polytechnic in Singapore and consulted with schools in China about preventive mental health. She teaches writing at Grub Street Writers, and is a developmental editor for writers of fiction and nonfiction.
Lynne has acted as the prose writer-in-residence at the Chautauqua Institution, moderated panels at national conferences such as the Muse & The Marketplace Conference, the Boston Book Festival, and the 2020 & 2022 Key West Literary Workshops.
Her short stories, essays, are articles have appeared in Solstice Literary Magazine; Chautauqua; The Drum Literary Magazine; Brain, Child; The Writer; School Library Journal; Parenting; Boston Globe; Writer Unboxed; Boston Herald; Psychology Today; Huffington Post, and more.
She lives outside Boston, Massachusetts with her family.
To learn more, visit lynnereeves.com
Mazey Eddings is a neurodiverse author, dentist, and (most importantly) stage mom to her cats, Yaya and Zadie. She can most often be found reading romance novels under her weighted blanket and asking her boyfriend to bring her snacks. She’s made it her personal mission in life to destigmatize mental health issues and write love stories for every brain. With roots in Ohio and Philadelphia, she now calls North Carolina home.
New York Times–bestselling author Julia Scheeres and award-winning journalist Allison Gilbert have written the first biography of American writer Elsie Robinson: Listen, World! (Seal Press, September 27, 2022). Robinson, a newspaper columnist who used her national platform to defy social mores, became the highest-paid woman writer in the William Randolph Hearst media empire. Their cinematic narrative weaves meticulous research with Robinson’s own inspiring and often hilarious words, taken from her columns, interviews, books, and letters—most never digitized or previously available to today’s readers.
Allison Gilbert is the author of numerous books. She executive produced two film projects in collaboration with the 9/11 Memorial & Museum: a documentary called, "Reporting 9/11 and Why It Still Matters,” and a 20-part series, "Women Journalists of 9/11: Their Stories” featuring journalists Tom Brokaw, Savannah Guthrie, the New York Times’ Maggie Haberman, NPR’s Linda Wertheimer, and 60 Minutes' correspondent and anchor Scott Pelley, and many others. Allison lives in New York with her husband and two children.
To learn more, visit allisongilbert.com
Sarah McCraw Crow is the author of the novel The Wrong Kind of Woman (MIRA Books). She is a longtime magazine writer, editor, and book reviewer, and her articles, essays, and reviews have run in BookPage, The Christian Science Monitor, Prime Number, Family Circle, Ladies’ Home Journal, Parents, Parenting, American Baby, Baby Talk, and Working Mother, among others. Her short fiction has won prizes from So to Speak and Good Housekeeping, and her stories have been honored as contest finalists by Press 53, New Letters, Yemasee, and Stanford Alumni Magazine.
As a child, Sarah lived in Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, and Texas as her dad finished his medical training and served in the military, but she did most of her growing up in Virginia. For the past twenty years, she has called New Hampshire home. She lives with her husband and three almost-grown children on an old farm, where she gardens in the summer and snowshoes in the winter, if there’s snow. And although she’s a transplanted Southerner, she has come to realize that temperamentally, she’s a northern New Englander.
She is a graduate of Dartmouth College (AB, history), Stanford University (MA, journalism), and Vermont College of Fine Arts (MFA in writing), and she’s a member of Grub Street, Boston, and the National Book Critics Circle.
Learn more at https://sarahmccrawcrow.com
Christie Leigh Babirad is a published fiction author of four books and a companion journal, and a poetess of two full-length collections, Sapphire Stars and Scarlet Secrets.
Her work has been featured in Tiny Buddha, The Mindful Word, and Dan’s Papers.
Christie Leigh believes we all have many unique purposes in this life, the greatest
one being “to love” and to follow that which stirs the heart.
She adores her family, which includes a spunky Jack Russell Terrier, Alistair, who
likes to don sweaters and fancy collars in the chillier months. She credits her family,
friends, and fans of her work for inspiring her craft, and that is one of the many reasons
why she will always say that there is no such thing as being “self-made.” She strongly
feels that we are a collection of the people who have come in and out of our lives and
placed love and belief in our hearts.
The primary hope she has for her readers is that her words and stories comfort and
inspire them, letting them know that they are never alone. She wants her readers to
know that their feelings have a real place, and that this life can be so much bigger and
grander, if we let love and optimism fully into our hearts. She also believes in an after-
life and that we remain connected to the ones who have moved on to Heaven. She’s a
romantic and looks up at the sky often, marveling at its enormity and how the colors and
clouds are always changing and the stars keep shining, no matter what.
You can follow her art on social media @ the following sites to find out more about her
latest projects.
Facebook @authorchristieleighbabirad
Goodreads @cbabiradauthor
Instagram and Pinterest @christieleighbabiradauthor
Bradeigh Godfrey is a physician, mom of four, and a writer. Her medical career is focused on caring for veterans with visible and invisible disabilities, and she is passionate about improving quality of life and wellness in veterans through research, teaching, and clinical work. Her debut novel, IMPOSTER, is a psychological thriller exploring sisterhood, secrets, and the neuroscience of memory and trauma (Blackstone, September 13, 2022). She’s an avid reader and book reviewer and can be found on Instagram (@bradeighgodfrey) sharing her latest reads. Bradeigh also co-writes romantic women’s fiction under the pen name Ali Brady (www.AliBradyBooks.net).
Kelly J. Ford is the author of Real Bad Things (summer 2022) and the award-winning Cottonmouths, a novel of “impressive depths of character and setting” according to the Los Angeles Review, which named it one of their Best Books of 2017. An Arkansas native, Kelly writes about the power and pitfalls of friendship, the danger of long-held secrets, and the transcendent grittiness of the Ozarks and their surrounds. She lives in Vermont with her wife and cat. Kelly is also a co-host of the Writer’s Bone podcast Happy Hour episodes. Learn more at KELLYJFORD.COM
Amina Akhtar is a former fashion writer and editor. Her satirical first novel, #FashionVictim, drew rave reviews and acclaim and was covered in the Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Martha Stewart Living, Entertainment Weekly, Fashionista, Book Riot, CrimeReads, and more. Akhtar’s new book Kismet takes on the world of wellness and all the crystals that go with it. This #OwnVoices novel is set in Sedona, Arizona, where nature is just as much a character as anyone else. Akhtar has worked at Vogue, Elle, the New York Times, and New York Magazine, where she was the founding editor of the women’s blog The Cut. She’s written for numerous publications, including Yahoo Style, Fashionista, xoJane, Refinery29, Billboard, and more. She currently lives not too far from the Sedona vortexes. Kismet is her second novel. Learn more at aminaaktar.work
Barbara Bourland is the author of Fake Like Me, a finalist for the 2020 Edgar Best Novel Award. Fake Like Me was published by Grand Central in North America, and riverrun abroad, and in Japan by Hayakawa. It was written with support from The Wassaic Project in Wassaic, NY.
Her debut novel, I’ll Eat When I’m Dead, was a Refinery29 Best Book of 2017 and Irish Independent Book of the Year. It was published in North America by Grand Central Publishing; in Ireland, Great Britain, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa by riverrun; and in Hebrew by Matar Press in Israel.
Her third novel, The Force of Such Beauty, follows a retired Olympic athlete who marries a prince. It will be published by Dutton in 2022.
Bourland's novels use imaginative escapism to process an emotional condition (in chronological order: I'll Eat When I'm Dead, the compulsion to control our appearance; Fake Like Me, the worry that we aren’t good enough; The Force of Such Beauty, the desire to be special) endemic to contemporary women’s lives. Cast in the mold of universal literary forms—the detective story, the thriller, the fairytale—they weave in and out of their genres, until the plot turns inside out and the narrative, upon reflection, appears to be something else entirely.
She's at work on her fourth novel, Fields and Waves, forthcoming from Dutton in 2024.
She lives in Baltimore.
Learn more at barbarabourland.com.
Marilyn Simon Rothstein is the author of three novels: Crazy to Leave You (May, 2022), Husbands and Other. Sharp Objects (2018) and Lift and Separate 2016), winner of the Star Award presented by the Women's Fiction. Writers Association for Outstanding Debut. All are published by Lake Union.
Visit: https://www.marilynsimonrothstein.com/
Eileen Grace Brill is a painter, writer, and Sign Language Interpreter who grew up outside of Philadelphia and graduated from Carnegie Mellon with a B.S. in Economics. She has written professionally for the restaurant, hotel, and commercial real estate industries. A Letter in the Wall is her first novel, though she has been a writer all her life, beginning at age four when she wrote a poem (filled with spelling errors!) for her babysitter. Eileen’s short story “Christmas Angel”appeared in the international literary magazine Beyond Words in 2021.She and her husband Eli raised their sons in her hometown of Elkins Park, Pennsylvania, where they still live, along with their two adopted mutts, Athena and Gaia.
Learn more: eileenbrill.com
Lynda Cohen Loigman grew up in Longmeadow, MA. She received a B.A. in English and American Literature from Harvard College and a J.D. from Columbia Law School. Her debut novel, Two-Family House, was a USA Today bestseller and a nominee for the Goodreads 2016 Choice Awards in Historical Fiction.
Her second novel, The Wartime Sisters, was selected as a Woman’s World Book Club pick and a Best Book of 2019 by Real Simple Magazine. The Matchmakers Gift is her third novel.
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Multiple New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Jill Shalvis lives in a small town in the Sierras full of quirky characters. Any resemblance to the quirky characters in her books is … mostly coincidental. Look for Jill’s bestselling, award-winning heartwarming and full of humor novels wherever books are sold and visit her website for a complete book list and blog detailing her city-girl-living-in-the-mountains adventures. Her most recent book, The Family You Make, was just published last month and her next book, The Friendship Pact, comes out in June.
To learn more, visit jillshalvis.com
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Nicole Baart is a New York Times bestselling author, collaborator, ghostwriter, and speaker. Her critically acclaimed novels have been featured in Southern Living, Country Woman, Book Page, Glam, and Yahoo! Lifestyle among several others.
Learn more at nicolebaart.com
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MONKEY BUSINESS is writer-producer Carleton Eastlake’s debut novel about a conflicted TV writer on location in Florida who becomes obsessed with a mysterious woman at a nightclub when she upends everything he thought he understood about life, limerence, bonded love, power, creativity, paintball combat, and what psychologists and philosophers refer to as the Hard Problem of human consciousness. Monkeys – and parrots – do play a role. As does Chairman Mao. And, in a cameo appearance, NASA.
For more, visit carletoneastlake.com.
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Jennifer Weiner is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of nineteen books, including That Summer, Big Summer, Mrs. Everything, In Her Shoes, Good in Bed, and a memoir in essays, Hungry Heart. She has appeared on many national television programs, including the Today show and Good Morning America, and her work has been published in the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times, among other newspapers and magazines. Jennifer lives with her family in Philadelphia.
Visit her online at JenniferWeiner.com.
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Davida G. Breier was born in Miami, FL and spent her formative years in Florida, rural Minnesota, urban New Jersey, and suburban Pennsylvania. She’s worked as a youth sports photographer, TV extra, substitute teacher, jewelry maker, bookseller, and ATM cleaner. Davida discovered the world of zines and independent publishing in 1994 and Baltimore’s City Paper awarded her with “Best Local Zinester” in 2000 and “Best Zine” in 2003. She won the Literary Death Match, Baltimore 3.0 event in 2011. She’s spent the last two decades in various roles within the book industry and currently works for Johns Hopkins University Press. Davida lives in Maryland with her family, a pack of wee rescue dogs, a rescue tortoise, and two companion chickens.
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Namrata Patel is an Indian-American writer who lives in Boston. Her writing examines diaspora, dual-cultural identity among Indian-Americans and explores this dynamic while also touching on both—the family’s we’re born with and those we choose. Namrata has lived in India, Spokane, London, and New York City.
Namrata has been writing for most of her adult life and loves creating characters who are relatable and aspirational. Her heroines range from quiet to kick-ass and her heroes are swoon-worthy, if a little flawed.
Namrata is represented by Sarah Younger at Nancy Yost Literary Agency.
Learn more at nampatel.com
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Rochelle B. Weinstein is the USA Today and Amazon bestselling author of This Is Not How It Ends, Somebody’s Daughter, Where We Fall, The Mourning After, and What We Leave Behind. Rochelle spent her early years, always with a book in hand, raised by the likes of Sidney Sheldon and Judy Blume. A former entertainment industry executive, she splits her time between sunny South Florida and the mountains of North Carolina. When she’s not writing, Rochelle can be found mentoring at-risk young women through Women of Tomorrow, teaching workshops at Nova Southeastern University, hiking, reading, and finding the world’s best nachos. When We Let Go released on 5/17, and she is currently working on her sixth novel releasing Spring 2023.
Please visit her at www.rochelleweinstein.com.
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Annie Hartnett is the author of novels RABBIT CAKE (Tin House Books, 2017) and UNLIKELY ANIMALS (Ballantine/Random House, 2022).
Unlikely Animals was the April 2022 book club selection for Good Housekeeping magazine and Amerie’s Book club. It received starred reviews from Booklist and Bookpage, and was an April Indie Next pick.
Rabbit Cake was listed as one of Kirkus Reviews' Best Books of 2017, was a finalist for the New England Book Award, an Indies Introduce and an Indie Next Pick, and was long-listed for the Center for Fiction's First Novel Prize. It received starred reviews from Publisher's Weekly, Kirkus, and Library Journal, and was People magazine's Book of the Week. It is currently under option with Amazon Studios (more on that here!).
Annie has been awarded fellowships and residencies from the MacDowell Colony, Sewanee Writers' Conference, and the Associates of the Boston Public Library. She holds degrees from the MFA program at the University of Alabama, Middlebury College's Bread Loaf School of English, and Hamilton College. She lives in Massachusetts with her husband, daughter, and dog.
Visit anniehartnett.com
Here to Save You podcast: @HTSYpod
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With numerous AudioFile Earphones Awards and nearly 200 audiobooks to her credit so far, Xe Sands is known for her ability to make an audiobook an intimate experience for her listeners. Interestingly, Sands didn’t come to audiobooks through acting as most narrators do. She began her adult life as a visual artist. “I used to paint. I did a lot of photo manipulation, and just a whole bunch of handcrafting of all kinds.” How did she get involved in the audio world? “My daughter and I had a long commute for many years, and we went through a million audiobooks.” She also read aloud to her daughter, until it dawned on her: “I would love to do that.” She didn’t think her voice would be one that anyone would want to hear, but she really wanted to try her hand at narration. So in 2008, she discovered a supportive audio community that encouraged recording. She worked with them for a few years before she was “discovered.” She’s won several of the coveted AudioFile Earphones Awards and has narrated novels for Alafair Burke, Kristan Higgins, Bethany Crandell, Lily King, Jami Attenberg, BA Shapiro, Darby Kane, Kennedy Ryan, Chuck Wendig, Juliette Blackwell, CD Reese, KJ Dell'Antonia, Hannah Morrissey, Paul Tremblay, Carrington MacDuffie, Judy Blume, and many more, including Kris's second novel, Sissie Klein is Completely Normal.
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With numerous AudioFile Earphones Awards and nearly 200 audiobooks to her credit so far, Xe Sands is known for her ability to make an audiobook an intimate experience for her listeners. Interestingly, Sands didn’t come to audiobooks through acting as most narrators do. She began her adult life as a visual artist. “I used to paint. I did a lot of photo manipulation, and just a whole bunch of handcrafting of all kinds.” How did she get involved in the audio world? “My daughter and I had a long commute for many years, and we went through a million audiobooks.” She also read aloud to her daughter, until it dawned on her: “I would love to do that.” She didn’t think her voice would be one that anyone would want to hear, but she really wanted to try her hand at narration. So in 2008, she discovered a supportive audio community that encouraged recording. She worked with them for a few years before she was “discovered.” She’s won several of the coveted AudioFile Earphones Awards and has narrated novels for Alafair Burke, Kristan Higgins, Bethany Crandell, Lily King, Jami Attenberg, BA Shapiro, Darby Kane, Kennedy Ryan, Chuck Wendig, Juliette Blackwell, CD Reese, KJ Dell'Antonia, Hannah Morrissey, Paul Tremblay, Carrington MacDuffie, Judy Blume, and many more, including Kris's second novel, Sissie Klein is Completely Normal.
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Carlisle Webber refused to major in English in college because she didn’t think there was anything fun to read on the required lists. No Stephen King? No R.L. Stine? No thanks! After college, she took her love of commercial, YA, and middle grade fiction to the University of Pittsburgh School of Information Sciences, where she earned a Master of Library and Information Sciences. She worked as a public librarian for years before deciding to move to the business side of publishing. She attended the Columbia Publishing Course and holds a Professional Certificate in Editing from UC-Berkeley. She is a literary agent with Fuse Literary.
Learn more at fuseliterary.com.
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Grant Snider writes, draws, and lives in Wichita, Kansas. His first book, "The Shape of Ideas," is a personal exploration of the joys and frustrations of the creative process. His work has appeared in The New York Times Book Review, The New Yorker, The Kansas City Star, The Best American Comics 2013, and across the internet as the popular strip "Incidental Comics." Grant works as an orthodontist in his day job. You can often find him carrying a sketchbook, lost in his own thoughts.
In The Art of Living, cartoonist Grant Snider, author of The Shape of Ideas and I Will Judge You by Your Bookshelf, has created an all-new collection of one- and two-page comics that map his inner thoughts, poetic observations, and frequent failures at living mindfully. With both humor and a touch of reality, The Art of Living centers on mindfulness, but also empathy, relaxation, gratitude, and awareness—evergreen subjects that are more important and relevant now than ever. With a striking package, The Art of Living is an extension of the themes of Snider’s first two books—which explored the creative process and the love of reading—and is the perfect gift for those in a need of reflection, commiseration, hope, and a little extra self-care. Above all, Snider's cartoons will inspire and encourage a more thoughtful way of experiencing the world.
To learn more visit, grantsnider.com or incidentalcomics.com
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JENNY MOLLEN is a writer, actor, Instagram personality and New York Times bestselling author of the essay collections I Like You Just the Way I Am and Live Fast Die Hot. Her digital series, “I Like You Just the Way I Am,” which she wrote and in which she stars, currently streams on ABC Digital. Heralded by The Huffington Post as one of the funniest women on both Twitter and Instagram and named one of “Five to Follow” by T Magazine, Jenny wrote a standing column for Parents magazine and has contributed to Cosmopolitan, Glamour, New York, Elle.com, Grub Hub, and Wake Up Call with Katie Couric.
With her Instagram handles @jennymollen and @dictatorlunches, Jenny has more than half a million followers.
Learn more at jennymollen.com
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After a short career in law, Leanne Kale Sparks is returning to her first love—writing about murder, mayhem, and crime. Currently, she is an author with Crooked Lane Books and is working on a new series featuring an FBI agent hunting down her best friend’s murderer. The backdrop is the Rocky Mountains of Colorado, the playground of her youth, and the place that will always be home. She currently resides in Texas with her husband and German Shepherd, Zoe.
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Karen Winn received her MFA from Fairleigh Dickinson University. She also holds a doctoral degree in nursing. Born and raised in New Jersey, Karen now lives in Boston with her husband and two children. Our Little World is her first novel.
Learn more at karenlwinn.com
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Lydia Kang is an author of young adult fiction, adult fiction and non-fiction, and poetry. She graduated from Columbia University and New York University School of Medicine, completing her residency and chief residency at Bellevue Hospital in New York City. She is a practicing physician who has gained a reputation for helping fellow writers achieve medical accuracy in fiction. Her poetry and non-fiction have been published in JAMA, The Annals of Internal Medicine, Canadian Medical Association Journal, Journal of General Internal Medicine, and Great Weather for Media. She believes in science and knocking on wood, and currently lives in Omaha with her husband and three children.
This episode includes a brief mention of a fictional character's suicide. If you or someone you know needs help, contact the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 800-273-8255.
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Elle Marr strives to tell powerful and compelling stories of women who demonstrate resilience in the face of great obstacles. She is the author of thrillers, THE MISSING SISTER (2020), LIES WE BURY (2021), and STRANGERS WE KNOW (May 2022).
THE MISSING SISTER was a #1 Amazon bestseller, #1 in the Kindle Store, an Amazon Charts bestseller, featured in Woman’s World, and named one of PopSugar’s “31 Thrillers of 2020.” LIES WE BURY earned a Kirkus starred review, was named one of The Nerd Daily’s Eagerly Anticipated Thrillers, and reached #1 in Serial Killer Fiction for four straight weeks. Publisher’s Weekly said, “Marr is a writer to watch.”
Originally from Sacramento, Elle Marr graduated from UC San Diego before moving to France, where she earned a master’s degree from the Sorbonne University in Paris. When not working on her next book, she enjoys watching French Netflix shows with the subtitles off, in Oregon, where she lives with her family.
Learn more at ellemarr.com
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Polly Hamilton Hilsabeck was in the second wave of women ordained priest in the Episcopal Church and lives with her husband in Durham, North Carolina. Her debut novel is American Blues.
Learn more at pollyhamiltonhilsabeck.com
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Elissa Grossell Dickey is a former journalist who now works in higher education communications. Though she grew up in Northern Minnesota, Elissa now lives in South Dakota with her husband and children. She has shared her journey of living with multiple sclerosis through blog posts for the National MS Society. The Speed of Light is her debut novel. Her second novel, Iris in the Dark, is coming in spring 2022. Learn more at elissaadickey.wordpress.com.
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Lisa Roe spent many years as an advertising creative director and copywriter in New York City until she accepted the tougher job of stay-at-home mom and turned to writing fiction — mostly to entertain her kids, but then to tell her own stories. Her debut novel is Welcome to the Neighborhood.
Learn more at lisaroe.com
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New York Times, USA Today, Wall Street Journal and #1 Publishers Weekly bestselling author RaeAnne Thayne has written more than 70 books since selling her first book in 1995. She has received a career achievement award from Romantic Times for series romantic adventure, as well as a Pioneer of Romance award. She finds inspiration from the beautiful mountains of northern Utah, where she lives with her family.
Her books have been described as “poignant and sweet,” with “beautiful, honest storytelling (that) goes straight to the heart.”
1 NYT Bestselling Author Debbie Macomber: “Reading these stories of small-town life engages the reader’s heart and emotions, inspiring hope and the belief miracles are possible.”
1 NYT Bestselling Author Robyn Carr: “RaeAnne Thayne gets better with every book!”
RT Book Reviews: RaeAnne Thayne has a knack for capturing those emotions that come from the heart.”
Frolic: “Thayne knows how to write the perfect romance.”
Learn more at raeannethayne.com
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Christy Texeira is a mother and entrepreneur. Her award-winning interior design skills have been featured in Better Homes and Gardens and Colorado Homes and Lifestyles. Parenting for Christy draws on her talent for problem-solving in unique ways. Though there are no official awards for being a mom, being a parent is her greatest accomplishment. She has excelled in the extraordinary obstacles that come with having a child with a life-threatening illness. The Colorado native resides in Northern Colorado with her family and beloved dog, Malucca. Taking advantage of the active lifestyle the scenic state has to offer, she is a lover of all things outdoors, including skiing, gardening, rock climbing, and hiking fourteeners.
Learn more at www.pinkelephantsbook.com
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Suzanne Park is a Korean American writer who was born and raised in Tennessee.
In her former life as a stand up comedian, Suzanne appeared on BET's "Coming to the Stage," was the winner of the Seattle Sierra Mist Comedy Competition, and was a semi-finalist in NBC's "Stand Up For Diversity" showcase in San Francisco.
Suzanne graduated from Columbia University and received an MBA Degree from UCLA. She currently resides in Los Angeles with her husband, female offspring, and a sneaky rat that creeps around on her back patio. In her spare time, she procrastinates. Her novels have been featured in “best of” lists in NPR, Popsugar, Real Simple, Country Living, Bustle, Buzzfeed, Marie Claire, Parade, Shondaland and The Today Show.
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Nicole Meier is a multi-published author and book coach living in the Pacific Northwest.
Her debut novel, THE HOUSE OF BRADBURY, was chosen as a Best Book of 2016 by Refinery29. Her second book, THE GIRL MADE OF CLAY, was named a Top Book according to Bookbub readers. Her newest novel, THE SECOND CHANCE SUPPER CLUB, is out now. Nicole has taught writing workshops in schools, libraries, wellness retreats, and writers' conferences. She currently works as a book coach for fiction writers. Her works have been published in The Oregonian, Cascade Journal, Southern Oregon Magazine, Women Writers Women’s Books, Brazen Woman, and more.
Find her online at @nicolemeierwrites on Instagram
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Jessica Brody is the author of more than 20 novels for teens, tweens, and adults including The Geography of Lost Things, The Chaos of Standing Still, I Speak Boy, A Week of Mondays, 52 Reasons to Hate My Father, the Unremembered trilogy, and the System Divine trilogy which is a sci-fi reimagining of Victor Hugo's Les Misérables, co-written with Joanne Rendell. She’s also the author of Save the Cat! Writes a Novel (the #1 bestselling plotting guide for novelists) and several books based on popular Disney franchises like Descendants and LEGO Disney Princess. Jessica’s books have been translated and published in over 25 countries and several have been optioned for film and television. She lives with her husband and three dogs near Portland, OR.
Visit her online at JessicaBrody.com. Follow her on Twitter or Instagram @JessicaBrody
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Lindsey J. Palmer is a writer, editor, and educator. She is the author of four novels, RESERVATIONS FOR SIX, OTHERWISE ENGAGED, IF WE LIVED HERE, and PRETTY IN INK. She worked in the magazine industry for many years, most recently as Features Editor at Self, and previously at Redbook and Glamour. A graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, she earned a Master of Arts in English Education from Teachers College, Columbia University, and taught A.P. Literature and Creative Writing at a Manhattan public school for several years. Nowadays she’s a senior editor at BrainPOP, an animated educational site for kids, which means she spends her days researching topics as diverse as Alan Turing, Juneteenth, and Mindfulness, and then translating what she’s learned into an engaging, narrative format. Lindsey lives on Cape Cod with her husband and daughter. Visit her at lindseyjpalmer.com and www.facebook.com/lindseyjpalmerauthor.
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Rea Frey is the celebrated author of Not Her Daughter, Because You're Mine, and Until I Find You. She also is the founder and CEO of Writeway, where aspiring writers become published authors. To learn more, please visit reafrey.com or writewayco.com.
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BookPage calls Katherine Center “the reigning queen of comfort reads.” She’s the New York Times bestselling author of eight books, including How to Walk Away, Things You Save in a Fire, and her newest, What You Wish For. Katherine writes laugh-and-cry books about how life knocks us down—and how we get back up. She’s been compared to both Jane Austen and Nora Ephron, and the Dallas Morning News calls her stories, “satisfying in the most soul-nourishing way.” Her books have made countless Best-Of lists, including RealSimple’s Best Books of 2020, Amazon’s Top 100 Books of 2019, Goodreads’ Best Books of the Year, and many more. Bestselling author Emily Henry calls her summer 2022 book, The Bodyguard, “a shot of pure joy.” The movie adaptation of Katherine’s novel The Lost Husband (starring Josh Duhamel) hit #1 on Netflix, and her novel Happiness for Beginners is in production now as a Netflix original starring Ellie Kemper. Katherine lives in her hometown of Houston, Texas, with her husband, two kids, and their fluffy-but-fierce dog.
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Alena Dillon is the author of Mercy House, a Library Journal Best Book of 2020, which has been optioned as a television series produced by Amy Schumer, The Happiest Girl in the World, a Good Morning America pick, My Body Is A Big Fat Temple, a memoir of pregnancy and early parenting, and Eyes Turned Skyward, a novel forthcoming Fall 2022.
Alena’s work has appeared in publications including The Daily Beast, LitHub, River Teeth, Slice Magazine, The Rumpus, and Bustle.
She teaches creative writing and lives on the north shore of Boston with her husband, son, black lab, and lots of books.
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Phoebe Fox is a former journalist and a relationship columnist for the Huffington Post, Elite Daily, and SheKnows. She’s been obsessed with words since she sounded out her first one with Sesame Street, and now writes funny, touching contemporary women’s fiction about relationships, heartbreak, loss, grief, and all the ways the people we love drive us crazy. One day she plans to finally figure out why we gloriously illogical humans do the strange things we do. Phoebe lives in Austin, Texas, with her husband and two excellent dogs.
Also known as Tiffany Yates Martin, she has served authors and publishing houses as a developmental editor through her company FoxPrint Editorial on books by New York Times, USA Today, and Wall Street Journal bestsellers, award winners, as well as newer authors, and has published the widely acclaimed guide, Intuitive Editing.
To learn more about Phoebe Fox novels, visit Phoebefox.com.
To learn more about Intuitive Editing, visit foxprinteditorial.com.
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Travis is a full-time audiobook narrator who has lent his voice to hundreds of stories. Before that, he spent decades designing and building video games like Torchlight, Rebel Galaxy, and Fate. Apparently, he now also writes books. He lives in the Pacific Northwest with his very patient family and their small, nervous dog.
Legends and Lattes is Travis's debut novel.
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Robert Gwaltney, a writer of southern fiction, is a graduate of Florida State University. He resides in Atlanta Georgia where he is an active member of the Atlanta literary community. By day, he serves as Vice President of Easter Seals North Georgia, Inc., Children Services, a non-profit supporting children with disabilities and other special needs. Robert’s work has appeared in such publications as The Signal Mountain Review and The Dead Mule School of Southern Literature. Robert also serves as Prose Editor for The Blue Mountain Review.
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USA Today Bestselling author Sariah Wilson has never jumped out of an airplane, never climbed Mt. Everest, and is not a former CIA operative. She has, however, been madly, passionately in love with her soulmate and is a fervent believer in happily ever afters—which is why she writes romance. She grew up in southern California, graduated from Brigham Young University (go Cougars!) with a semi-useless degree in history, and is the oldest of nine (yes, nine) children. She currently lives with the aforementioned soulmate and their children in Utah, along with cats named Pixel, Callie, and Belle who do not get along. (The cats, not the children. Although the children sometimes have their issues, too.)
Sariah's book ROYAL DATE was selected as one of the first winners in Amazon's Kindle Scout program. Her novella ROYAL DESIGN helped launch Amazon Publishing's Kindle in Motion technology, and she had her own Kindle World for THE ROYALS OF MONTERRA. Her books THE FRIEND ZONE and ROOMMAID were selected by Amazon as one of the Best Romances of 2019 and 2020, respectively. She has repeatedly hit Amazon's overall Top 100 (both in and outside the USA) and been a #1 bestseller on Amazon category lists multiple times. Her book ROOMMAID was the most read book from Amazon's website in September 2020.
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Piper Huguley seeks to make new inroads in the publication of historical romance by featuring African American Christian characters. The Lawyer’s Luck and The Preacher’s Promise, the first books in her “Home to Milford College” series, are Amazon best sellers. The Mayor’s Mission, published in Winter 2014.
The next entry in the series, The Representative’s Revolt will publish in Spring 2015. She is a 2013 Golden Heart finalist for her novel, A Champion’s Heart—the fourth book in “Migrations of the Heart”. The first book in the series, A Virtuous Ruby, was the first-place winner in The Golden Rose Contest in 2013 and was a Golden Heart finalist in 2014. The first three books in the “Migrations of the Heart” series, which follows the loves and lives of African American sisters during America’s greatest internal migration in the first part of the twentieth century, will be published by Samhain Publishing in 2015. She lives in Atlanta, Georgia with her husband and son.
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Her best-selling comedic memoir, The One You Want to Marry (And Other Identities I've Had), was published by Topple Books on October 1st 2021.
You can now hear her in the new Audible Original Hit Job alongside Pete Davidson and Keke Palmer and as Emily in Hot White Heist directed by Alan Cumming. She currently hosts the critically acclaimed and sold out satirical comedy show, The Lesbian Agenda.
Sophie has appeared on Watch What Happens Live with Andy Cohen, Jimmy Kimmel Live!, and MTV News. She’s written for shows on Bravo and MTV. She’s also written for Broadway Video and her writing has been featured in New York Magazine & McSweeney's. She’s been featured in Bustle, them., Autostraddle, and more. Sophie has performed at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival and The Kennedy Center. Follow her on social media @sophieesantos for lesbian propaganda.
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Maggie Smith founded ArtSource, a leading art consulting company, but when her business was acquired in 2017, she pursued her dream to became a full-time writer. The result is her debut novel, Truth and Other Lies, published March 8, 2022, by Ten16 Press. In addition to writing, Maggie hosts the podcast Hear Us Roar for the Women’s Fiction Writers Association, which boasts over 110 episodes and is available on Apple Podcast, Spotify, IHeartRadio, and Amazon Music. Her short story, THE DEVIL YOU KNOW, was published in the 2018 anthology False Faces and she’s a monthly blogger for Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers. A board member of the Chicago Writer’s Association, she serves as Managing Editor of their on-line literary publication The Write City Magazine. She makes her home in Milwaukee with her husband Scott and her aging but adorable dog Colt.
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Kerry Chaput believes in warm drinks and tall tales. Her debut historical novel, DAUGHTER OF THE KING, publishes on December 16, 2021. This is book one of the DEFYING THE CROWN series. Kerry honed her research skills while earning her Doctorate degree and now focuses her research on fascinating stories from history. She lives in Bend, Oregon with her husband, children, and two rescue pups.
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Randy Susan Meyers is the bestselling author of five novels, which have
been translated in over twenty different countries and cited by the
Massachusetts Council of the Book as “Must Read Books.” A BrooklynBoston mix who believes happiness requires family, friends, books, and an
occasional New York bagel, she lives in Boston with her husband, where
she teaches writing seminars at the Grub Street Writers' Center and at
Northampton's Writer in Progress. You can find more about her at
randysusanmeyers.com.
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Mazey Eddings is a neurodiverse author, dentist, and (most importantly) stage mom to her cats, Yaya and Zadie. She can most often be found reading romance novels under her weighted blanket and asking her boyfriend to bring her snacks. She’s made it her personal mission in life to destigmatize mental health issues and write love stories for every brain. With roots in Ohio and North Carolina, she now calls Philadelphia home. She’s the author of Lizzie Blake’s Best Mistake and A Brush with Love.
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Lisa Barr is the award-winning author of WOMAN ON FIRE, THE UNBREAKABLES and the historical thriller FUGITIVE COLORS, a suspenseful tale of stolen art, love, lust, deception and revenge on the "eve" of WWII. The novel won the IPPY gold medal for "Best Literary Fiction 2014” and first prize at The Hollywood Film Festival (Opus Magnum Discovery Award). In addition, Lisa served as an editor for The Jerusalem Post, managing editor of Today's Chicago Woman, managing editor of Moment magazine, and as an editor/reporter for the Chicago Sun-Times. Among the highlights of her career, Lisa covered the famous “handshake” between the late Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, the late PLO leader Yasser Arafat, and President Bill Clinton at the White House. Lisa has been featured on Good Morning America and Today for her work as an author, journalist, and blogger. In breaking book news: Actress Sharon Stone is set to produce and star in the film adaptation of WOMAN ON FIRE.
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Author of romantic comedies and contemporary romance, Kelly moved from the city to enjoy the charm of northern Ontario. When she’s not out hiking or home devouring books, you can find her, notepad in hand, scribbling down one of the many plot bunnies bouncing around in her head. Her novels have been published internationally.
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Ann-Marie Nieves’ fascination with the power of the media began at age three, when she voraciously began reading newspapers to the point that her mother had to hide them from her. Her entrepreneurial instincts kicked in comparatively late – at the age of six – when she launched her summer camp’s premiere gossip magazine. Other forays into publishing and feature writing throughout high school and college career ultimately pointed her to her professional destiny: public relations.
Ann-Marie is an award-winning communicator with experience across a broad range of industries in both the business-to-consumer and business-to-business sectors. She is a highly experienced communications strategist, social media specialist and copywriter who excels at launching new businesses. She has created successful campaigns for clients in industry sectors as diverse as non-profit, books/authors, health, pets, music, real estate, food, music, entertainment, “green” and education.
Ann-Marie has garnered placements in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, CNN, NPR, Marketwatch, Fitness, Parade, Working Mother, Fox Business Network, and Oprah.
Prior to founding Get Red PR, Ann-Marie held positions with Shea Communications, Hamilton Ink and Giles Communications. She holds a Bachelor of Arts in Literature from Purchase College.
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Jacquelyn Mitchard is the New York Times bestselling author of 22 novels for adults and teenagers, and the recipient of Great Britain’s Talkabout prize, The Bram Stoker and Shirley Jackson awards, and named to the short list for the Women’s Prize for Fiction. Her first novel, The Deep End of the Ocean, was the inaugural selection of the Oprah Winfrey Book Club, with more than 3 million copies in print in 34 languages. It was later adapted into a major feature film starring Michelle Pfeiffer. Her novel Still Summer has also been adapted for a film still in production. She has also an essay collection, The Rest of Us: Dispatches from the Mother Ship, drawn from her newspaper column syndicated by Tribune Media. Mitchard’s essays also have been published in magazines worldwide, widely anthologized, and incorporated into school curricula. She served on the Fiction jury for the 2003 National Book Awards, and was editor-in-chief of Merit Press, a Young Adult imprint under the aegis of Simon and Schuster.
A Chicago native, Mitchard grew up the daughter of a plumber and a hardware store clerk who met as rodeo riders. She is a Distinguished Fellow at the Ragdale Foundation and a DeWitt Clinton Readers Digest Fellow at the Macdowell Colony. She has taught in MFA program for Creative Writing at Vermont College of Fine Arts, Miami University of Ohio and Western New England University and was speechwriter for Secretary of Health and Human Services Donna E. Shalala during the first days of the Clinton administration and at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. An avid Italian cook, she lives on Cape Cod with her husband and their nine children. Her newest novel, The Good Son, a story about two women, one whose son was convicted of murdering the other’s daughter, is out from Mira/HarperCollins.
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Eric Smith is a literary agent and Young Adult author from Elizabeth, New Jersey.
As an agent with P.S. Literary, he’s worked on New York Times bestselling and award-winning books. His recent novels include the YALSA Best Books for Young Readers selection Don’t Read the Comments (Inkyard Press, 2020), You Can Go Your Own Way (Inkyard Press, 2021), and the anthology Battle of the Bands (Candlewick, 2021), co-edited with award-winning author Lauren Gibaldi.
His next book, Jagged Little Pill: The Novel, written with Alanis Morissette, Diablo Cody, and Glen Ballard, will be published with Abrams in April 2022. It’s an adaptation of the Grammy and Tony award winning musical.
His other books include the IndieBound bestseller The Geek’s Guide to Dating (Quirk), the Inked duology (Bloomsbury), and The Girl and the Grove (Flux). His writing has sold into eight languages.
A lifelong lover of writing and books, he holds a Bachelor of Arts from Kean University in English, and a Master’s in English from Arcadia University, where he currently mentors MFA students. He lives in Philadelphia with his wife and son, and enjoys video games, pop punk, and crying over every movie.
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Award winning author Sonali Dev discusses her latest release, The Wedding Setup, a heartfelt short story about one woman’s journey of self-discovery and what it means to be happy. While she's hanging out at the Writing Table, she provides a peek into her writing life.
Sonali writes Bollywood-style love stories that let her explore issues faced by women around the world while still indulging her faith in a happily ever after. Her novels have been on Library Journal, NPR, Washington Post and Kirkus Best Books of the year lists. She has won the American Library Association’s award for best romance, the RT Reviewer’s Choice award for best contemporary romance, the RT Seal of Excellence, and is a RITA Finalist.
Sonali lives in the Chicago suburbs with her very patient and often amused husband and two teens who demand both patience and humor, and the world’s most perfect dog.
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Kristan Higgins is the New York Times, USA TODAY and Publishers Weekly bestselling author of more than twenty novels, which have been translated into more than two dozen languages and have sold millions of copies worldwide. Her books have received dozens of awards and accolades, including starred reviews from Entertainment Weekly, People, Kirkus, The New York Journal of Books, Publishers Weekly, Library Journal and Booklist.
The happy mother of two snarky and entertaining grown children, Kristan enjoys gardening, mixology, the National Parks and complimenting strangers on their children. She lives in Connecticut with her heroic firefighter husband, cuddly dog and indifferent cat.
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Kerry Anne King (who also writes as Kerry Schafer) is a Washington Post and Amazon charts bestselling author who writes compelling and transformational stories about family and personal growth. She loves to add in mystery, humor and an undercurrent of romance, and celebrates when she succeeds in making readers both laugh and cry.
Kerry Anne has been chosen as the 2020 Writer of the Year by the Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers Association. Her most recent novel, Everything You Are, is a finalist in the Nancy Pearl Awards hosted by the Pacific Northwest Writers Association. In addition to writing, she is enthusiastic about encouraging and supporting other writers and is the host of Tell Me Your Secrets, a videocast/podcast featuring lively, informal interviews with authors and other people involved in bringing books into the world.
When not absorbed in creative pursuits, you’ll find Kerry Anne hanging out with her real life Viking on their little piece of heaven in rural northeastern Washington. Learn more at allthingskerry.com.
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Jenn Bouchard has been teaching high school social studies for twenty-two years. She is an avid cook, volunteer for good causes, and devoted Red Sox fan. A graduate of Bates College and Tufts University, she lives in the Boston suburbs with her husband and two children.
In her spare time, Jenn volunteers as both a fundraiser and secretary for her Bates College class and is a past president of the alumni association. She is a member of Grub Street, Women Fiction Writers' Association, and Women in Development of Greater Boston. She is an avid cook and is always planning her next adventure. FIRST COURSE was published in 2021 by TouchPoint Press. You will find her short stories in The Bookends Review, Litbreak Magazine, The Penmen Review, and the Little Patuxent Review. She is currently editing her second novel, titled PALMS ON THE CAPE.
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Elle Cosimano is the Edgar-nominated and award-winning author of the acclaimed young adult novels Nearly Gone, Holding Smoke, The Suffering Tree, and Seasons of the Storm. Her debut novel for adults, Finlay Donovan Is Killing It, kicked off a witty, fast-paced contemporary mystery series, which was featured as a People Magazine Pick and one of New York Public Library's Best Books of 2021. In addition to writing novels for teens and adults, her essays have appeared in The Huffington Post and Time. Cosimano lives with her husband and two sons in Virginia.
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Since her debut in 1997, New York Times bestseller Laura Lippman has been recognized as one of the most gifted and versatile crime novelists working today. Her series novels, stand-alones and short stories have all won major awards, including the Edgar and the Anthony, and her work is published in more than 20 countries. A former Baltimore Sun journalist, she has written for the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, O, The Oprah Magazine, Real Simple, Glamour and Longreads. "Simply one of our best novelists, period," the Washington Post said upon the publication of the ground-breaking What the Dead Know.
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Kristin Rockaway is a native New Yorker and recovering corporate software engineer. After working in the IT industry for far too many years, she finally traded the city for the surf and chased her dreams out to Southern California, where she spends her days happily writing stories instead of code. When she’s not working, she enjoys spending time with her husband and son, browsing the aisles of her neighborhood bookstores, and trying to catch up on sleep.
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Zibby Books is hosting #22in22 to encourage readers to visit bookstores 22 times in 2022. Learn more at https://www.22in22.net.
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Bestselling author Boo Walker initially tapped his creative muse as a songwriter and banjoist in Nashville before working his way west to Washington State, where he bought a gentleman’s farm on the Yakima River. It was there amongst the grapevines and wine barrels that he fell in love with telling high-impact stories that now resonate with book clubs around the world. Rich with colorful characters and boundless soul, his novels will leave you with an open heart and a lifted spirit.
Always a wanderer, Boo currently lives in Valencia, Spain with his wife and son.
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Gabrielle St. George chats about screenwriting and what inspired her novel, How to Murder a Marriage.
HelenKay Dimon discusses her multi-genre writing career and her next novel, The Replacement Wife. HelenKay Dimon is a former divorce lawyer turned bestselling author of more than 40 Romantic Suspense, Contemporary, and Erotic Romance books and novellas. Her books have been featured in various national and international venues and she has had two books named Red-Hot Reads in Cosmo magazine. She is a four-time RITA® Award finalist in romantic suspense (for Mr. and Mr. Smith, Facing Fire, Guarding Mr. Fine and The Fixer) and is 2018 RITA® Award winner for The Fixer. She’s also a Reviewers’ Choice Best Book Award winner in romantic suspense for The Fixer. In addition to writing, HelenKay is Chair of the Policy Advisory Committee of the Romance Writers of America and frequently teaches workshops and classes on fiction writing and romance writing. She lives in San Diego where she is (or should be) working on her next series but might be streaming a show on Netflix.
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Karma Brown discusses her new holiday rom-com, The Holiday Swap (co-written with Marissa Stapley as Maggie Knox), her nonfiction work, The 4% Fix, and how curiosity and a 5:00 am combine to fuel creativity.
This episode includes a limited-time-only discount code for Apricot Lane Peoria.
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Tamara Grantham discusses her best selling YA novels, and her newest middle grade novel, The Not So Chosen One.
Liza Nash Taylor, a Hawthornden Fellow, discusses how her Keswick Farm home has inspired her historical novels.
Literary agent, Carly Watters, a frequent guest on the podcast, The Sh*t No One Tells You About Writing, takes a seat at the Writing Table to share her view on what it takes to become a published author.
Leslie Rasmussen discusses her start in television writing that led to writing women's fiction.
Matthew FitzSimmons discusses the surprising origins for his ideas and how his latest novel, Constance inspired a series.
Reyna Gentin discusses her middle grade novel, My Name is Layla, and her women's fiction, Both Are True.
Kwana Jackson, also known as K.M. Jackson, discusses her writing journey, writing friendships, and Keanu Reeves.
Author of YA novels, Bethany Crandell discusses her recent work in women's fiction: The Jake Ryan Complex and her sophomore novel, See Jane Snap, released in September.
Alexa Martin discusses her writing journey and how she makes time to write while raising her four lovely children.
Maddie Dawson discusses writing, author friendships, and her latest novel, The Magic of Found Objects.
Lea Geller discusses how she carves out time for the writing life while working and raising a family.
Kimberly Willis Holt talks about her storied career as an author of literature for young readers.
Closing out the summer with Elyssa Friedland, author of The Last Summer at the Golden Hotel--a novel marrying the old with the new.
A book for all ages, Poison for Breakfast offers equal parts humor, philosophy, and writing craft. Daniel Handler talks about Lemony's evolution.
Taylor Moore discusses how his work in the CIA proved beneficial in writing his western thriller, Down Range.
Author of Float Plan, The Suite Spot, and a collection of YA novels, Trish Doller discusses her writing career.
Kerry Lonsdale discusses her new book, her work as a founding member of the Women's Fiction Writer's Association, and a major health scare.
Julie Cantrell discusses her background, her writing, and why she enjoys coaching other writers.
During a laugh-filled discussion, Laurie Frankel hits on her writing process, why she's passionate about writing novels involving families--in the many forms they take, and her latest novel, One, Two, Three.
Susie Orman Schnall talks about her groundbreaking work with The Balance Project and how her writing career has taken her in a new direction.
Nicolas DiDomizio discusses his life before getting "the call," his debut novel, Burn It All Down, and what he's working on now.
Camille Pagan talks about the ups and downs of writing and her new book, Don't Make Me Turn This Life Around
Zibby Owens discusses Moms Don't Have Time: A Quarantine Anthology and how books brought her through difficulties.
Xio Axelrod discusses her writing journey, musical influences, and the friends who supported her along the way.
Romance writer Priscilla Olivares discusses Key West, family, writing with a Latinx flavor, and her new novel, Anchored Hearts.
Amy E. Reichert discusses her new book, the Tall Poppies, the Bloom Room, and why writers shouldn't ask Stephen King about querying.
Alison Hammer discusses her new book, Little Pieces of Me, her writing group, Every Damn Day Writers, and why she takes a "finish first" philosophy.
A preview of Kris Clink's Writing Table Podcast--a place for writers and book lovers to get to know authors, discuss writing, and learn about publishing, featuring: Kimberly Belle, Kathleen Barber, Molly Harper, Zibby Owens, Amy Poeppel and more!
Meet Kathleen Barber, author of Truth Be Told and Follow Me. Her first novel, originally published as "Are You Sleeping" became a series starring Octavia Spencer.
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Molly Harper discusses writing, vampires, and what she didn't find in bookstores that made her write that first book.
Amy Poeppel details the manuscript she had to leave behind and why her books will always include healthy doses of humor.
Psychological suspense writer, Kimberly Belle, talks about writing during the lockdown, recent projects, and what writers should do while they wait for "the call."