The Drowning Woman by Robyn Harding

A special thank you to the publisher, Grand Central Publishing, for an ARC in exchange for an honest review. 

Lee Gulliver never thought she’d find herself living on the streets—no one ever does—but when her restaurant fails, and she falls deeper into debt, she leaves her old life behind with nothing but her clothes and her Toyota Corolla. In Seattle, she parks in a secluded spot by the beach to lay low and plan her next move—until early one morning, she sees a sobbing woman throw herself into the ocean. Lee hauls the woman back to the surface, but instead of appreciation, she is met with fury. The drowning woman, Hazel, tells her that she wanted to die, that she’s trapped in a toxic, abusive marriage, that she’s a prisoner in her own home. Lee has thwarted her one chance to escape her life.

Out of options, Hazel retreats to her gilded cage, and Lee thinks she’s seen the last of her, until her unexpected return the next morning. Bonded by disparate but difficult circumstances, the women soon strike up a close and unlikely friendship. And then one day, Hazel makes a shocking request: she wants Lee to help her disappear. It’ll be easy, Hazel assures her, but Lee soon learns that nothing is as it seems, and that Hazel may not be the friend Lee thought she was.

This psychological thriller about friendship and betrayal is a masterclass in suspense. Robyn Harding's writing is intricate, twisty, and propulsive—readers won't know who to believe and who to root for. 

Harding explores some of the social issues that were exacerbated by the pandemic—homelessness, financial instability, and domestic violence—and how women were affected. With their different social statuses (Lee being homeless and Hazel living in an affluent neighbourhood) it appears that the women don't have much in common, but in actuality, they were equally impacted by the fallout from COVID-19.  

The Drowning Woman is a bit of a departure for Harding in the way that it is structured—although the story is told from alternating perspectives, it is actually done by parts verses chapters. Part one is told from Lee's point of view and then in part two, it switches to Hazel's perspective which gives the reader insight into her life. The novel goes back and forth one more time before the epilogue. 

Expertly plotted and perfectly paced, The Drowning Woman is completely binge-worthy. Highly recommend!

BUY NOW

LISTEN NOW

ROBYN HARDING is the author of thirteen novels including The Swap, The Party, Her Pretty Face, and The Arrangement. She has also written and executive produced an independent film.

Harding lives in Vancouver, British Columbia, with her husband and two children. 

---

Q & A with Robyn Harding*

GWR: If you could tell your younger self something about writing and becoming an author, what would it be?

 RH: I’d tell myself that this career is a roller coaster and not to expect a steady upward trajectory. 

GWR: You have published 13 books to date. Are you still learning? Do you approach each book the same way?

RH: I’m always learning! And I love to challenge myself and to try new things with my writing. While I approach each book in a similar way (I start with a premise, beat out the plot structure, and then create the  characters), I experiment with perspective, the style of narration, and the way into a story. 

GWR: Give us your best Hollywood pitch for The Drowning Woman.

RH: When a homeless woman fleeing a dangerous past saves a wealthy society wife from drowning, she’s drawn into a dark web of secrets, lies, and murder.  

GWR: Where did you come up with the concept for the novel? 

RH: I was really moved by how women were disproportionally impacted by the pandemic. Businesses owned by women were more likely to fail, female rates of anxiety and depression spiked, and domestic abuse skyrocketed. I wanted to explore two characters who had lost so much of themselves and tell a story of their resilience…with some murder thrown in, of course.

GWR: The Drowning Woman is told from both Lee and Hazel’s perspective—was it easier or more challenging to explore the parallel storylines?

RH: It was a challenge, but such a fun one! This book has a unique structure that I’ve never used before. Part one offers Lee’s point of view and in part two, I switch to Hazel’s POV so readers see what was happening behind the scenes. This continues through parts three and four. I’ve loved this storytelling device in film and TV and wanted to try it in a novel. 

GWR: Did the story end the way you’d initially thought?

RH: I knew the ending when I started, but some of the twists along the way came unexpectedly. Because I wrote this book without a contract, I had more time and more freedom to take chances. If I’d had a deadline and an editor breathing down my neck, I think I would have gone a safer, more expected route.

GWR: If your book was a beverage, what would it be?

RH: Whiskey neat.

GWR: Who has been your favourite character to write (from any of your books)? 

RH: I think I had the most fun writing Low Morrison from The Swap. She has such a unique, dry, humorous outlook on life.

GWR: What’s the one element of a thriller that is a must? 

RH: A sense of menace!

GWR: What are you working on now?

RH: My next novel is called The Haters. It’s about high school counsellor Camryn Lane who publishes her first novel to great acclaim. She’s over the moon, until she receives an anonymous email accusing her of exploiting her students and writing about their private issues. She pushes it aside, but the accusations bloom on social media and soon disturbing incidents invade her personal life. Is this the work of random trolls? Or is the abuse coming from closer to home? Camryn must find out who is behind these attacks before they destroy her career, her relationships, and threaten her very life.

*A version of this post was published on STYLE Canada.

The Paris Deception by Bryn Turnbull

A special thank you to HarperCollins Canada for a copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.

Art restorer Sophie Dixon fled Stuttgart with her brother as the Nazi regime gained power in Germany. Three years later, she returns to Berlin in horror to witness Entartete Kunst, the government-sanctioned exhibition and destruction of Germany’s modern art. When her adopted home city of Paris is conquered by the Nazis, Sophie reluctantly accepts an offer to continue her work at the Jeu de Paume Museum under the supervision of the Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg, a German art commission that uses the museum as a repository for art they’ve looted from Jewish families.

Fabienne Brandt was a rising star in the Parisian bohemian arts movement until the Nazis put a stop to so-called “degenerate art”. Still mourning the loss of her firebrand husband, she’s resolved to muddle her way through the occupation in whatever way she can—until her estranged sister-in-law Sophie arrives at her door with a stolen painting in hand. Realizing that Paris’s modern art might soon meet the same fate as their counterparts in Entartete Kunst, the two women embark upon a plan to save Paris’s “degenerates”, working beneath the noses of Germany’s top art connoisseurs to replace the paintings in the Jeu de Paume with skillful forgeries—but when Hermann Goering’s handpicked art dealer devises his own plan for the modern artwork in the Jeu de Paume, how long can Sophie and Fabienne sustain their masterful illusion?

Fascinating and meticulously researched, Bryn Turnbull's latest offering isn't just a story about World War II and the resistance—this book highlights the impact on the art community where it is estimated that during the Second World War, the Nazis looted some 600,000 paintings from Jews. This staggering number makes up almost 20 percent of all of the art in Europe and there are at least 100,000 of which that are still missing today. Hitler’s cleansing of modern art was not only designed to enrich the Third Reich, but also integral to the Holocaust’s goal of eliminating all traces of Jewish identity and culture. 

The Paris Deception is told told from the dual perspectives of sisters-in-law who—despite their fragile relationship—have banded together in order to save the modern masterpieces from the Nazis. Turnbull strikes the right balance between fact and fiction with her immersive and compelling writing. The attention to detail is as intricate as one of Fabienne’s forgeries.

This story about bravery, the bonds of friendship, and lost loves is a must read for any historical fiction lover. The Paris Deception sparkles like champagne—highly recommend!

BUY NOW

LISTEN NOW

BRYN TURNBULL is an internationally bestselling author of historical fiction. Equipped with a Master of Letters in Creative Writing from the University of St. Andrews, a Master of Professional Communication from Toronto Metropolitan University, and a Bachelor's degree in English Literature from McGill University, Bryn focuses on finding stories of women lost within the cracks of the historical record. 

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. The Paris Deception is her third novel. 

---

Q & A with Bryn Turnbull*

GWR: How did you start writing/become a writer? 

BT: My family would tell you that I’ve always been a writer. I honestly don’t remember a time where I wasn’t jotting down a story or character ideas in some notebook or another. I became a writer in earnest in 2015, when I came across the person who would become the subject of my first novel, Thelma Furness. At the time I was working in corporate communications, and I felt so strongly about writing that novel that I quit my job and moved to Scotland for a year to write what became The Woman Before Wallis. The rest, as they say, is history.

GWR: Are you a pantser/gardener or a plotter/architect? What does your writing process look like?

BT: I’m a plotter, for sure—the first few months of my process involves creating long, elaborate Excel spreadsheets which break the book down scene by scene in as much detail as I can muster, then going back and refining those scene breakdowns so they flow together properly. I also do lots of research for my books, diving deep into the socio-political historical and context of my chosen setting month by month and year by year so my characters can play against that context properly.

GWR: Can you tell us about the research process for The Paris Deception—what did you enjoy most about it and was there anything you discovered that surprised you? 

BT: This was such a fascinating book to research because not only was I putting my characters within a context I’d been wanting to write about for years—the impact of the Second World War on Europe’s art community—but also because I got to give my characters very specialized jobs: one is an art conservator, one is an art forger, and another is a champagne maker. Needless to say, I went down some great research rabbit holes with each of them: for my conservator character, Sophie, I was able to tour the laboratories of some incredible modern day conservators, and for Fabienne I was able to meet a real-life art forger who walked me through some of the methods they used to forge art. I was also able to travel to France to research this book, and spent days in the Jardin des Tuileries planning an art heist before heading to Reims to tour champagne houses… all in the name of research, of course!

GWR: What was the genesis of the novel? 

BT: The novel came out of a challenge set to me by my brother, who wanted me to write a book that he would like better than his favourite movie, The Thomas Crown Affair. Needless to say, it was a tall order, but the idea of writing a book about an art heist piqued my interest. I recalled the case of a forger in 1943 who sold a fake Vermeer to Hermann Goering in 1943, and the two ideas merged together in my mind: a book about an art heist, set during the Second World War. 

GWR: What comes first for you—the overall idea or the characters?   

BT: When I wrote my first two novels, the character came first, because both books were based on actual historical heroines. With this novel, the main characters are fictional so I built them around the book’s setting. I knew I needed a character with the kind of specialized skill set that would enable her to avoid being dismissed by the Germans when they take over the museum, so it felt appropriate to make Sophie an art conservator, and the idea of making her German—of making her a conscientious objector to Hitler’s regime, who feels a sense of responsibility to set things right in what way she could, felt like it would be an interesting dynamic to include in the novel. Fabienne was also born out of context: I needed a skilled artist with access to a different setting that would provide the backdrop for a compelling secondary storyline.  

GWR: How did you balance crafting a good story against historical accuracy? Did you take any creative liberties?

BT: Historical fiction tends to lie somewhere along a spectrum between complete historical accuracy and complete fiction, and where possible I like to set my novels closer to the historical record than not. With this novel, I’ve put fictional characters—and a fictional mission—in an all too real historical context: the looting of priceless collections of art from Jewish families across Nazi-occupied Europe. The museum where the action takes place—the Jeu de Paume—was indeed used by a Nazi art commission called the ERR as a storehouse for plundered artwork, and as a gallery for high-ranking Nazis like Hermann Goering to select the choicest works to send into Germany.

The history of the Room of Martyrs, and of so-called “degenerate” art in Nazi-occupied territories is also sadly accurate. Many works of modern art by artists including Van Gogh, Picasso, Dali, Cezanne, Kirchner and Klee were either destroyed by the Nazis or exchanged with dealers who sold them on to clients who either didn’t know or care that the paintings had been stolen from their rightful owners.

GWR: What made you decide to write the book from a dual point of view? Was it easier or more challenging to explore the parallel storyline?

BT: I loved writing from a dual perspective. I felt that having two main characters allowed me to open up the scope of the novel and explore different aspects of occupied France, as well as allowing me to layer in a few different emotional threads that would have been difficult to include with Sophie alone—she already had so much on her plate!

GWR: What do you hope readers will take away from The Paris Deception?

BT: When I wrote this novel I was fascinated by the notion of what resistance looked like for those who couldn’t or didn’t join the “capital-R” Resistance. With the benefit of hindsight, it seems so simple to say that if we were in occupied France we would do the right thing and stand up against tyranny, but not everyone could become a radio operator or blow up railway lines in the name of freedom. What did resistance look like on an individual level? How did people resist within their own sphere of influence?

I hope that people take away the idea that there are so many different ways to stand up for your principles, and to do the right thing—that individual resistance, small-scale resistance, can still make a meaningful difference.

GWR: Can you share what are you working on now?

BT: I’m moving a few decades forward in history (and a bit further northeast) to write about a couple that gets separated by the Berlin Wall. 

*A version of this post was published on STYLE Canada.

The Whispers by Ashley Audrain

A special thank you to Penguin Random House Canada for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

On Harlow Street, the well-to-do neighbor­hood couples and their children gather for a barbecue as the summer winds down. Everything is fabulous until Whitney, the picture-perfect hostess, explodes in fury because her son disobeys her. Everyone at the party hears her exquisite veneer crack—loud and clear. Before long, that same young boy falls from his bedside window in the middle of the night. And then his mother can only sit by her son’s hospital bed, where his life hangs in the balance.

Over the course of a tense three days, the women of the neighborhood grapple with what led to that terrible night. People-pleasing Blair, Whitney’s best friend, suspects something isn’t as it seems. Rebecca, the ER doctor who helps treat Whit­ney’s son, has struggled to have a child of her own. And the all-knowing Mara, the older woman next door, watches everyone’s world unravel from her front porch.

Ashley Audrain's sophomore effort is a propulsive page-turner. This character-driven psychological thriller centres around a tragedy and the ripple effect it has on four separate families. The Whispers is raw and visceral—not for the faint of heart.

The novel is told from the perspectives of four women: Whitney, a career woman and mother of three; Blair, a stay-at-home mom; Rebecca, a doctor who is struggling with miscarriages; and Mara, a widow in her eighties who is still grieving the death of her only son. The Whispers is also an examination of motherhood: how trying it can be, the pressure to be the perfect mother, how awful it is to want to be a one, and how devastating it is to lose a child and not be a mother anymore. 

What I love about Audrain’s books are all the nuances that start with the title and funnel down through the thematic elements. Whispers are what we don't want others to hear, the things we say to ourselves, what we say about others, and the things that may or may not be true. She captures all of these things behind the closed doors of her characters.  

Exploring themes of envy, desire, and motherhood, The Whispers is about giving in to impulse and about the whispers that we silence. Highly recommend!

*Trigger warning: miscarriage and infertility, discussion of suicide, infidelity, accident involving child.

BUY NOW

LISTEN NOW

ASHLEY AUDRAIN previously worked as the publicity director of Penguin Books Canada. Prior to Penguin, she worked in public relations. She is a graduate of the Media, Information & Technoculture program at Western University. The Push is her debut.

Audrain lives in Toronto, where she and her partner are raising their two young children. 

---

Q & A with Ashley Audrain*

GWR: Is there a particular author/work that inspired you to become a writer or the way you write? 

AA: I don’t know if there’s just one, but I’m certainly inspired by women writing page-turning stories about complex female characters, and I always have been. As a teenager, I loved to read the Oprah’s Book Club picks each month because she often focused on darker stories about women, and fiction that was very accessible. I probably read things a bit too mature for my age, but I think that curiosity is part of what makes reading so compelling for young people.

GWR: Did you approach writing The Whispers the same way as The Push? What does your writing process look like?

AA: It really felt like a very different writing process from start to finish in terms of where and when I was writing. I’d worked on The Push for a much longer time, in bigger chunks of time, and revised it at my own pace, all while having my babies—with The Whispers, I had a deadline and editors for the first time, and writing it also overlapped with the bulk of the pandemic. I found it really difficult to be productive and creative during that period, in a time crunch, with so many months of lockdown and schools closed in Toronto (I know we can all relate). I woke up every day at 5am to work through revisions until the kids woke up, and then the rest of the day was a complete write-off. That said, I’d learned a lot during the writing of The Push, including just how valuable BIG revisions are. It’s always painful to feel like you’re digging up the foundation of a book, but now I can see that’s a completely necessary part of my process. So, both books went through a lot of changes, and I didn’t have a fully developed structure for either of them before I started. I suppose that’s my writing process… make a mess and then try to clean it up! 

GWR: You have a publishing background—did this help or hinder your writing? What do you like most about the publishing process? What do you like the least?

AA: I think having a publishing background has only helped my writing, mostly because in publishing, you have to read so much and so widely, including genres you wouldn’t otherwise try and authors you hadn’t read before. Reading is such good ‘training’ for writing, especially if you’re paying keen attention to things like structure and voice and pacing. 

The thing I love most about the publishing process is that much-anticipated moment of (hopefully!) feeling like the draft is exactly where it should be—that a revision has accomplished what it needs to and is ready to send back to my (wonderful) editors. It’s such a satisfying part of the process, after a lot of hard work. The part I like least is probably the jumble of nerves and emotions just before publication, waiting to see how the novel will be received by readers and critics. There’s such little control during this time—the work is done, and all you can do is wait with fingers crossed.

GWR: What was the genesis of The Whispers?

AA: A few things were on my mind at the time I was developing The Whispers. First, I was living in Little Portugal in Toronto, and wanted to explore the feeling of that neighbourhood…the idea of young, busy families moving in, renovating old houses, and essentially taking over the street while the older Portuguese immigrants were trying to hang on to the porch culture they’d long established and enjoyed. Second, there was a bedroom window in my son’s room that didn’t have a lock (at first). He wasn’t big enough to reach the window, but I always had a terrible visual of him opening up the window in the middle of the night and falling out. This, of course, inspired a pivotal plot point in The Whispers…

And then, a bit later into the draft, I came across this concept of ‘the whispers’ on an episode of Oprah’s podcast, featuring a conversation with her best friend, Gayle King. Gayle shares about ‘the whispers’ she had long quieted about her marriage, until she couldn’t anymore—because she came home and found her husband with another woman. I loved this idea of the ways our life is always speaking to us, whether or not we want to hear it, and how complex this can be for women who are terrified of the consequences if they listen. 

GWR: Did any minor characters become major characters over the course of the novel?

AA: I think Mara grew the most as a character over the course of revisions—I loved her story from the beginning, but at one point she was more of grumpy voyeur, less involved in the plot. I love where she ended up, and I really enjoyed writing from her perspective.

GWR: What do you enjoy more: character development or plot?

AA: I think I enjoy thinking about character most, but I also find it the hardest to work through on the page. Often, I think I’ve conveyed something about a character in the story, but it’s really living more in my mind—this has been a consistent theme in my early reader feedback! I think it’s because I feel like I know these characters so well; as writers we often live with them long before they make it on the page. It’s sometimes hard to see what we haven’t communicated about them yet. 

GWR: You tackle some weightier subjects—miscarriage, infertility, infidelity, trauma—which topics do you wish more authors would write about?

AA: Definitely pregnancy loss, although I can understand why authors might choose not to. It’s a very personal and terrifying experience to go through. Although I can think of many characters who have had miscarriages, we don’t often see the physicality of it in real time on the page. When I had my miscarriages, it was striking to me how foreign the entire experience was—I knew nothing about what would really happen, how it would feel, how to deal with the aftermath. I think if we shared more about this on the page or on the screen, it might feel a bit less lonely for women who go through it.

GWR: I love how purposeful and layered the titles are of your novels—there are several connotations of “the whispers” which I won’t say to keep spoiler-free—do you select the titles or are you even conscious of the nuances the time of writing?  

AA: Thank you. I’ve always chosen the titles after the books were finished. The Push came to me at a completely random time, when I wasn’t meaning to be brainstorm title ideas (thank you, creative fairies!). The Whispers was a title suggested by a friend of mine who had read a very early draft; this was taken straight from a phrase in Blair’s inner dialogue, but as you’ve said, it certainly applies on several levels in the novel, and became a thread throughout as I was revising.

GWR: What are you working on now?

AA: I am starting to work on something new, but unfortunately can’t say anything about it yet! But it’s been a total joy to be in a new story, with a cast of new characters. 

*A version of this post was published on STYLE Canada.

A Death at the Party by Amy Stuart

A special thank you to the publishers, Simon & Schuster Canada, for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Nadine Walsh’s summer garden party is in full swing. The neighbours all have cocktails, the catered food is exquisite—everything’s going according to plan.

But Nadine—devoted wife, loving mother, and doting daughter—finds herself standing over a dead body in her basement while her guests clink glasses upstairs. What happened? How did it come to this?

Rewind to that morning, when Nadine is in her kitchen, making last-minute preparations before she welcomes more than a hundred guests to her home to celebrate her mother’s birthday. But her husband is of little help to her, her two grown children are consumed with their own concerns, and her mother—only her mother knows that today isn’t just a birthday party. It marks another anniversary as well.

Still, Nadine will focus just on tonight. Everyone deserves a celebration after the year they’ve had. A chance for fun. A chance to forget. But it’s hard to forget when Nadine’s head is swirling with secrets, haunting memories, and concerns about what might happen when her guests unite.

Stuart's first standalone novel is a modern twist on Virginia Woolf's Mrs. Dalloway. Taking place over a single day, A Death at the Party is a tense and clever domestic thriller. She turns the classic whodunit on its head—we know who the murderer is—but we don't know which partygoer ends up dead, or why.

Nadine is a complex character—a perfectionist who is brilliantly imperfect. She may look together and polished on the outside, but is struggling with memories that threaten to crack her perfect exterior. It is easy to assume that Nadine is an unreliable narrator, especially because she is taking medication that can cloud her judgement, but there is an insidiousness dark side to her.  

With its instant hook and short, punchy chapters, A Death at the Party is perfectly executed. It is a taut and riveting thriller that's chock full of secrets. A must read!

BUY NOW

LISTEN NOW

AMY STUART is the author of the Still series: Still Mine, Still Water, and Still Here, which have been optioned for television by Lark/NBC Universal. 

She has a MFA in Creative Writing through the University of British Columbia and worked for many years as a high school educator with the bulk of her career spent teaching guidance and English. Amy's other love is ice hockey—she is one of only four women head coaches in the GTHL, the world’s largest youth competitive hockey league. 

Stuart resides in Toronto with her husband and their three sons. They also spend much of their time on Prince Edward Island, where Amy’s family is originally from. 

---

Q & A with Amy Stuart*

GWR: Was there a particular author/work that inspired you to become a writer or the way that you write? 

AS: Early in my writing career I was always reading Alice Munro short stories, and I think she really taught me what attention to craft could do. Once I settled in to becoming a thriller writer, I turned to writers like Dennis Lehane, PD James, and Louise Erdrich, who are masters of plotting and the crumb dropping required in thrillers.

GWR: What is the best advice you have received as an author?

AS: Without a doubt, the best advice I’ve received is to focus as much as possible on the act of writing and not worry too much about other things you can’t control, like the publishing industry or the market or whether the book will be a bestseller or not. Whether you’re an aspiring writer or a long-published one, the fact remains that writing is the only part of the process that you solely control. It’s where all your power lies. So put most of your energy there! And in terms of the industry stuff, be a good student: Listen to the people who know what they’re talking about (agents, editors, publicists, etc) and learn from their wisdom.

GWR: A Death at the Party is your first standalone book, did your process differ from the way you approached the 'Still’ series?

AS: The process was definitely more confined, in the sense that I had to contain the entire story in one novel. I tried to lean into that sense of confinement instead of resisting it. I set the novel on a single day, limited the cast of characters and stuck to a handful of settings. Having less room to maneuver forced me to learn some new tricks as a writer. It was actually quite fun!

GWR: How did you come up with the concept—what sparked the idea?

AS: Years ago, I read Mrs. Dalloway, the 1925 classic novel by Virginia Woolf. It follows a woman—Clarissa Dalloway—over the course of a single day as she prepares for a party. Sound familiar? The premise of A Death at the Party is exactly the same, but with a dead body in the mix. I’ve always thought it would be great fun to take the structure of a classic novel and twist it into a thriller. So that’s what I did. 

GWR: Overall, what do you have more fun with, character development or plot?

AS: Yikes! I would say characters are more fun for me. Plotting is like a complex puzzle…when it’s working it’s wonderful, and when it’s not, it’s deeply frustrating. Characters are a little more pliable and forgiving, at least in the early stages of the process. I love layering in the quirks and characteristics that make them each their own person. 

GWR: What is the one element of a thriller that is a must?

AS: To me, the key element to a thriller is the question. In the case of A Death at the Party, the question isn’t “whodunit?” but instead “whydunit?” We know from the first pages who commits the murder, so the question becomes why she did (and also, who is dead). As thriller readers, we’re propelled forward because there’s a central question—or questions—we simply need answered. That’s what keeps us turning the pages.

GWR: Do your plot twists happen organically, or do you construct your books around them?

AS: That’s a tough question! I think it’s a combination of both. In A Death at the Party, a few of the major plot twists actually did come about organically; certain events made sense as I got to know the characters better. But I need the central twist to be known before I get too deep in the writing process, or else I’m apt to veer way off course.

GWR: Give your best Hollywood pitch for A Death at the Party and who would you cast?

AS: Hollywood pitch: Imagine a gorgeous party full of gorgeous people. A band playing, everyone dressed to the nines, drinks flowing. The speeches have just ended, with secrets revealed! All is perfect. Aside, of course, from the dead body in the basement. 

In terms of casting, I’ve always thought that Charlize Theron would make the perfect Nadine, and Michelle Pfeiffer, her mother Marilyn, because they’re only 20 years apart in age. From there, I’d give the Hollywood directors full liberties in choosing their cast. 

GWR: If your book was a beverage, what would it be? 

AS: A deliciously sweet cocktail with a hint of red in the colour and a flower for the garnish. 

GWR: What are you working on now?

AS: A lot of things! A screenplay, and a new novel. Too early for the Hollywood pitch, but I’m excited for it!

*A version of this post was published on STYLE Canada.

Meet Me at the Lake by Carley Fortune

A special thank you to the publisher, Penguin Canada, for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Fern Brookbanks has wasted far too much of her adult life thinking about Will Baxter. She spent just twenty-four hours in her early twenties with the aggravatingly attractive, idealistic artist, a chance encounter that spiraled into a daylong adventure in Toronto. The timing was wrong, but their connection was undeniable: they shared every secret, every dream, and made a pact to meet one year later. Fern showed up. Will didn't.

At thirty-two, Fern's life doesn't look at all how she once imagined it would. Instead of living in the city, Fern's back home, running her mother's Muskoka lakeside resort—something she vowed never to do. The place is in disarray, her ex-boyfriend's the manager, and Fern doesn't know where to begin.

She needs a plan—a lifeline. To her surprise, it comes in the form of Will, who arrives nine years too late, with a suitcase in tow and an offer to help on his lips. Will may be the only person who understands what Fern's going through. But how could she possibly trust this expensive-suit wearing mirage who seems nothing like the young man she met all those years ago. Will is hiding something, and Fern's not sure she wants to know what it is.

But ten years ago, Will Baxter rescued Fern. Can she do the same for him?

After a whirlwind daylong adventure, Ferm and Will make a promise that one of them keeps and the other breaks. Meet Me at the Lake is a beautiful story about missed connections and second chances set against the picturesque backdrop of Muskoka. 

Fortune's writing is effortless and immersive—she is a master of dialogue and witty banter. The narrative flows from past to present, urban to rural. Through well-developed and perfectly executed backstories, Fortune shows how Fern and Will become the present day versions of themselves. She also uses diary entries to fully flesh out the character of Maggie as well as Fern's memories in order to further explore the mother-daughter relationship which is a central theme of the book.  

Although there are similarities to Every Summer After—lake setting, the theme of grief, dual timeline—this is an entirely fresh story. Brimming with nostalgia for summers at the lake, Meet Me at the Lake is like coming home.

BUY NOW

LISTEN NOW

CARLEY FORTUNE is an award-winning journalist who also worked as an editor at some of Canada’s top publications, including The Globe and Mail, Chatelaine, Toronto Life, and was most recently the Executive Editor of Refinery29 Canada. Carley holds a Bachelor of Journalism from Toronto Metropolitan University (formerly Ryerson University). 

Carley spent her young life in the suburbs of Sydney, Australia, and in Barry’s Bay, a tiny lakeside town in rural Ontario and the setting for Every Summer After. 

Fortune lives in Toronto with her husband and two sons. 

---

Q & A with Carley Fortune*

GWR: Are you a pantser/gardener or a plotter/architect? What does your writing process look like? How many hours a day do you write?

CF: I’m a pantser. Before I begin, I have a broad concept for the story, and if there’s a twist or a reveal, I might know that too—though not always. I have the vaguest sense of who my characters are, but almost everything reveals itself as I write. I love that about my process. The way scenes, dialogue, and character quirks pop into my brain often feels like magic. 

Writing is my day job, and I approach it like one. As soon as my husband and kids are out the door, I get to work, breaking for lunch and (hopefully) exercise, and then am back to my keyboard until everyone gets home and chaos ensues. I tend to write my first draft quickly and without editing. But by the time I hand it in to my editors, I’ve revised the manuscript multiple times. 

 

GWR: You have a publishing background—did this help or hinder your writing? What do you like most about the publishing process?

CF: I was a journalist for sixteen years, working as an editor at outlets like Refinery29, Chatelaine, The Globe and Mail, and Toronto Life. So much of what I’ve learned about writing and the editorial process comes from my media background and from my journalism degree: the importance of clarity, selecting telling details, the tremendous value of editors, meeting deadlines, reaching an audience, the power of a good cover, and what it means to produce something at the intersection of art, craft, and commerce. 

What I love about book publishing is the extra time and attention that goes into the work, as well as the longevity of a novel compared to an article. My debut novel, Every Summer After, came out in May of 2022, and it boggles my mind that there are still thousands of people buying a copy of the book every week. I’ve always been passionate about my work, I’ve always put my heart and soul into my job, and now I feel like it’s absolutely worth the effort. I know I’m doing what I was meant to do.

 

GWR: What was the inspiration behind Meet Me at the Lake?

CF: Insomnia! I wrote Every Summer After in 2020 while I was pregnant with my second child, and we sold it in a two-book deal when I was eight months pregnant. I suffered insomnia throughout the pregnancy and after I gave birth. At the same time, I had to pitch an idea for my second book to my editor. I was lying awake in the middle of the night after a feeding, trying to figure out what the heck I was going to do. So I asked myself where I wanted to be. I find that writing is like reading, in that you’re transported to the characters’ world. And I saw it immediately: a classic lakeside resort in Muskoka, and Fern, who’s reluctantly back home running the place following the death of her mom. There’s a storyline told through a series of diary entries Fern’s mom wrote in the summer of 1990, and that came to me that night as well. The love story took longer to sort out. I decided to challenge myself to do the exact opposite thing I did with Every Summer After, where the characters fall in love over years. In Meet Me at the Lake, I wanted to build an intense, life-altering bond in just 24 hours. 

GWR: Did you start writing Meet Me at the Lake before the release of Every Summer After? Did the success of Every Summer After impact your writing of Meet Me at the Lake?

CF: By the time Every Summer After was published, I had already submitted the second draft of Meet Me at the Lake. Both my editor and agent, who are tremendously talented and savvy, had suggested having the second book well underway by the time the first came out. And I’m so glad I followed their advice. I already had a massive case of self-doubt while working my second book. I was worried my ability to write Every Summer After had been a fluke. We had big hopes for Every Summer After, but the way it exploded was a huge surprise, at least to me. I’m sure my imposter syndrome would have been almost debilitating had I been drafting Meet Me at the Lake when Every Summer After became a bestseller. 

 

GWR: Did any minor characters become major characters over the course of the novel?

CF: Yes. In my first draft of Meet Me at the Lake, Jamie, who is Fern’s ex and the manager of the resort, was not her ex. With every draft, he took on a greater role, which was so fun, because Jamie was one of my favourite characters to write. Maggie, who is Fern’s mom, was always a major character, but since she’s recently passed away when we meet Fern in the present-day storyline, she is mostly developed through her diary entries and through Fern’s memories. The mother-daughter relationship is core to the book, and my editors helped me give it (and Maggie herself) texture, weight, and specificity with every draft. 

 

GWR: You shift perspectives with the use of diary entries and alternate between past and present—what made you decide to write the book this way? Was it easier or more challenging to explore the parallel storyline?

CF: I love playing with time, and I enjoy books that experiment with structure and technique. I love it when characters have a history, so when I’m brainstorming, I tend to spend much of my effort creating elaborate backstories for my love interests. It feels natural for me to go back and forth between present and past storylines, and in some ways easier than writing one linear story—it’s like two short books in one, and I can pack in a lot. I’m interested in how our relationships to ourselves and others shift over time, and alternating timelines is a great tool for exploring that. 

 

GWR: There is strong nostalgia associated with your books for summers in Muskoka/Barry's Bay as well as the city of Toronto—why is it important to feature these Canadian settings versus a generic US locale?    

CF: Every Summer After is set in Toronto and Barry’s Bay, which is a small town in eastern Ontario where I lived from grade four until the end of high school. Barry’s Bay far less populated than Muskoka and quite far from the city. Meet Me at the Lake is set at a fictional resort in Muskoka and the Toronto of ten years ago. Every Summer After began as a project that was just for me. I wanted to write about how I grew up: on a lake, in the bush, with cottagers who come and go with the seasons. But when I realized it might become a published book, I asked agents whether they thought the Canadian setting might be a problem. I got mixed feedback. Honestly: I wouldn’t have set the book in the US, but I would have made the precise location of Barry’s Bay unknowable if it meant being published. Fortunately, both my editor (who is based in New York) and my agent (who is based in LA) loved the setting, and I’m so grateful it appears the way I initially wrote it. In hindsight, I think that’s one of the reasons it resonated with readers outside of Canada—there’s an escapist element we crave in our summer reads. My favourite part of writing Meet Me at the Lake was Will and Fern’s twenty-four hours in Toronto—I think it’s dreamy and magical and a love letter to the city the same way that Every Summer After was a love letter to Barry’s Bay. 

 

GWR: If your book was a beverage, what would it be? 

CF: French press coffee, black, the way Fern drinks it. 

 

GWR: What are you working on now?

CF: I’m working on my third book, which I am preposterously excited about. It’s the most fun I’ve had writing thus far, and I can’t wait to share more about it. (Hopefully later this summer!) 

*A version of this post was published on STYLE Canada.

Coronation Year by Jennifer Robson

A special thank you to the author for an ARC in exchange for an honest review. 

It is Coronation Year, 1953, and a new queen is about to be crowned. The people of London are in a mood to celebrate, none more so than the residents of the Blue Lion hotel.

Edie Howard, owner and operator of the floundering Blue Lion, has found the miracle she needs: on Coronation Day, Queen Elizabeth in her gold coach will pass by the hotel’s front door, allowing Edie to charge a fortune for rooms and, barring disaster, save her beloved home from financial ruin. Edie’s luck might just be turning, all thanks to a young queen about her own age. 

Stella Donati, a young Italian photographer and Holocaust survivor, has come to live at the Blue Lion while she takes up a coveted position at Picture Weekly magazine. London in celebration mode feels like a different world to her. As she learns the ins and outs of her new profession, Stella discovers a purpose and direction that honour her past and bring hope for her future.

James Geddes, a war hero and gifted artist, has struggled to make his mark in a world that disdains his Indian ancestry. At the Blue Lion, though, he is made to feel welcome and worthy. Yet even as his friendship with Edie deepens, he begins to suspect that something is badly amiss at his new home.

When anonymous threats focused on Coronation Day, the Blue Lion, and even the queen herself disrupt their mood of happy optimism, Edie and her friends must race to uncover the truth, save their home, and expose those who seek to erase the joy and promise of Coronation Year.

For fans of The Crown, Jennifer Robson's latest royal-adjacent historical novel counts down to Queen Elizabeth's Coronation. Set at London's historic Blue Lion hotel, Coronation Year is told from the perspectives of  Edie, the hotel owner; Stella, a budding photographer; and Jamie, an artist. 

Through her meticulous research, Robson's deftly balances the intricacies of historical fiction with romance (between Edie and Jamie) and mystery (a bomb threat on the day of the procession). The story is framed around the Coronation which also impacts the lives of the characters by bringing them into each other's orbit. 

The strong character development is not only reserved for the main characters, but also for the supporting cast which includes the hotel's staff and its eccentric boarders. And readers will be delighted with cameos of some former characters, as well as the Queen herself! 

Robson is a historical fiction force. Her attention to detail, beautiful prose, and memorable characters are what makes Coronation Year a standout.  

BUY NOW

LISTEN NOW

JENNIFER ROBSON is the internationally bestselling author of Somewhere in France, After the War Is Over, Moonlight Over Paris, Goodnight from London, The Gown, and Our Darkest Night. She studied French literature and Modern History as an undergraduate at King’s University College at Western University, then attended Saint Antony’s College at the University of Oxford, where she obtained her doctorate in British economic and social history. While at Oxford, she was a Commonwealth Scholar and SSHRC Doctoral Fellow.

Robson lives in Toronto with her husband and children. 

---

Q & A with Jennifer Robson*

GWR: Is there a particular author/work that inspired you to become a writer or the way you write? 


JR: Such a hard question to answer! I carry with me traces of every book I’ve read and loved, and I think this is true of most writers. In terms of singling out any one writer whose work inspired me to start writing, I know I’ve mentioned it many times in interviews but Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird has had an incalculable effect on me. Whenever I begin to worry that my well of inspiration has run dry, or that I don’t really know what I’m doing, I return to it and let her wise and oh-so-sensible advice sink in.


GWR: What was the genesis of the novel?


JR: With both The Gown and Coronation Year I began with a simple question: what was life like for ordinary people in 1947/1953? A straightforward character study of one or several characters’ struggles in those years would have been satisfying to write, but it would have been difficult to persuade readers new to my work to pick up what would have probably seemed like a pretty dry read! That’s when I settled on the idea of using the Royal Wedding and the Coronation as backdrops—they’d add a touch of royal glamour to the proceedings, and also make the narrative more interesting. There’s a reason that writers love anything that offers us a chance to compare/contrast the lives of characters in wildly different social strata.


GWR: What comes first for you—the overall idea or the characters?  


JR: First it’s the general idea—with Coronation Year, it was the notion that the Coronation procession passing by a certain place in London would have an outsize effect on the people living there. Then the characters came to me, beginning with Edie. As soon as I decided on her name I could picture everything else about her.


GWR: What character did you enjoy writing the most? 


JR: I loved all three of them—Edie, Jamie and Stella all felt like old friends by the time I wrote “The End.” Jamie was certainly the most challenging character to create, since his life was so radically different from my own. He’s a man, a person of colour, a veteran, and an artist. I can’t honestly say I truly know what it’s like to stand in his shoes, but I asked a lot of questions of people who do, and I incorporated their suggestions into the narrative, and I hope readers will find in him a character who is both believable and familiar.

GWR: 
I’m always amazed at the level of detail in your books—can you tell us about the research you did for Coronation Year? Do you have family ties to England?


JR: I do have family ties to the UK: my paternal grandparents were from Newcastle (pure Geordies) and my maternal grandmother was born near Stirling in Scotland. From them, and my parents in turn, I think I absorbed a sense of the British temperament and way of life that I might otherwise not have fully understood as a Canadian. 

In terms of research, I once again relied on my old standbys that were so useful when I was a graduate student: primary sources such as newspapers, magazines, and newsreels, memoirs and diaries, historic maps, and (boring but often useful) government documents. 


GWR: Why do you think there is such a fascination with the royal family and the history/traditions of the monarchy?


JR: Where do I even begin? I think the very longevity of the institution is one of the main reasons it interests so many of us: in our ever-changing, ever-renewing modern world there are simply very few things that stay the same. To a certain extent that feeling of permanence and solidity, over the course of almost a century, was embodied by the figure of Queen Elizabeth; but it’s also the case that the ancient ceremonies and objects that surround the British monarchy hold their own allure. Just think of the Coronation ceremony, elements of which date back nearly a thousand years, or the regalia itself, most of which is hundreds of years old. What else in our throwaway world can compare to that?

Separate from all of that, of course, is our interest in the royal family as celebrities; and while they may resist being thought of in such a way—no royal wishes to be remembered for what they wear, or scandals in which they’re embroiled—I think there’s no way to avoid it. The question, then, is how they ought to balance their celebrity status, and the enormous power that comes with it, against the gravitas that the institution itself demands. 


GWR: There is an element of mystery in Coronation Year—have you ever considered writing a different genre? 


JR: Absolutely not! I love reading mysteries but I find it such a challenge to successfully incorporate elements of mystery or suspense in my books. If I were ever to write in another genre it would most likely be a work of narrative non-fiction that focuses on a historic event or person.

GWR: 
If your book was a beverage, what would it be? 


JR: That’s easy—a cup of strong English breakfast tea with milk and just a little bit of sugar.

GWR: 
You’re always reading something good! What books are on your nightstand?


JR: I recently finished Starring Adele Astaire by Eliza Knight and I loved it—pure catnip from start to finish. I’m just about to dig into After Anne by Logan Steiner, which looks at the life of Lucy Maud Montgomery. And I also have a pile of books I bought on my January trip to England that are research material for my work-in-progress. (At least that’s how I justified lugging them back across the pond.)

GWR: 
What are you working on now?


JR: It’s early days yet so I’m a little shy about sharing too many details. I can say that it’s set in England in the 20th century and has a heroine I find absolutely fascinating. I’ll have more to say very soon—I promise!


*A version of this post was published on STYLE Canada.