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| Hi there! Today we’re chatting with the author of this fall’s most-anticipated rom-com. Plus, we’re checking out a new collection of fairytale retellings and in honor of all the family time coming up this weekend, surveying fictional family drama. |
 | The Introduction |
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| Ashley Herring Brown’s Adult Coming Out Story |
The Book
Since breaking up with her fiancé, Astrid Parker has thrown herself into her interior design business. A job on the renovation show Innside America could be her big break—as long as the stubborn (but distractingly beautiful) carpenter who seems to disagree with every decision she makes doesn’t ruin it.
The Author
Ashley Herring Blake won awards as a children’s and young adult author before making the leap to adult romance with last year’s smash hit Delilah Green Doesn’t Care. She’s back with one of fall’s most-anticipated romantic comedies.
Astrid was an important secondary character in your first adult romance, Delilah Green Doesn't Care. Why did you make her the main character for this book?
Ashley Herring Blake: I knew when planning Delilah’s book that I wanted to write a series where each book featured a member of a tight-knit friend group and their romance. Astrid, with everything she went through in Delilah’s story, felt like the natural choice for book two. There are some who don’t love Astrid in Delilah’s book, which is understandable—she’s a bit prickly! But I loved exploring her complexities and, out of all three books, her story is my favorite.
Astrid is good at her job, but she doesn't love it. How does the question of competence vs. passion play into the story?
AHB: Astrid has been taught all of her life that competence, her reputation, her success is really all that matters. Excel and no one can take that away from you. She’s lost a lot in her childhood, so this push from her mother, her only parent, was the only way she knew how to be in the world. She hadn’t thought of what she wanted in a long time, so passion isn’t something that she ever prioritized—until now.
Astrid is the only one of her close friends that doesn't identify as queer at the start of the book. Is this a coming out story?
AHB: It is! I think we really need coming out stories in adult romance. It’s a pretty common theme in queer middle grade and young adult, but a later-in-life queer awakening is common and is actually my own experience. I think Astrid’s story will resonate with a lot of people, and while Astrid certainly has myriad mommy issues, I also enjoyed writing this coming out story in a way that doesn’t feel traumatic. It’s not without its complications, but Astrid has a strong and supportive group of people in her life who help her feel empowered and safe.
Check out three books that inspire Ashley Herring Blake: |
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 | | Such a Fun Age | | AHB: I love Kiley’s sharp, precise prose and complicated emotions. | |
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 | | Take a Hint, Dani Brown | | AHB: The bisexual main character fake dates an absolute cinnamon roll rugby player and the spice level is high. Emotional and super sexy—my two favorite things. | |
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 | The Highlight |
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| “That spring, the girls began to disappear. The first girl, picking tea in the white heat of midday. In those long rows of emerald-green bushes, vipers sometimes sunned themselves, threaded through the branches like deadly streamers. But if it’d been a snake that killed her, where was her body?” | |
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 | | At Midnight | | 15 of readers’ favorite YA authors contribute stories to this collection of fairytale retellings that includes everything from well-known yarns like Rumpelstiltskin to less-told stories like “Fitcher’s Bird.” | |
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 | 20 Words: Guess The Novel |
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| Four bored siblings discover a malfunctioning piece of furniture, make unusual new friends, and take candy from the wrong stranger. | |
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| Answer in footer |
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 | The List |
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| Holiday Festivities, Family Drama |
| In Lynn Steger Strong’s new novel Flight, three adult siblings gather for the first Christmas after the death of their mother. Each brings their own baggage and unique form of grief to the holiday as they figure out what to do with their mother’s house. Holidays, weddings, funerals—whatever the cause of the get together, reunions are ripe with dramatic potential. Here are three more recent novels set at family gatherings: |
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 | | The Family Chao | | The Chao brothers reunite in Haven, Wisconsin for their annual uncomfortable Christmas, but this year is different: their long-suffering mother has left their domineering father and the future of the family’s restaurant is up for grabs. | |
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 | | Keya Das's Second Act | | When a divorced professor discovers a script among his daughter’s things—a script she was working on before her untimely death—he reconnects with his estranged family to put on a production of the play. | |
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 | | Big Chicas Don't Cry | | Four cousins who were inseparable as children but drifted apart come together to grieve their beloved grandmother and rediscover the friendship that was essential as they were growing up. | |
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 | Bookmarks |
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Critical Love
The Seattle Times calls Howrey’s story about a professional dancer and her gay father “a soul-stirring novel” and the New York Times lauds it as “gorgeous and grueling.” |
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 | | They're Going to Love You | | Carlisle returns to New York to visit her dying father, who she has been estranged from for nearly two decades, and reflects on their relationship and how it shaped her and her career as a dancer. | |
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The Big Debut
Nylon calls Allie Rowbottom’s fiction debut “a mesmerizing, addictive novel” and Publishers Weekly says it's “pitch-perfect.” |
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 | | Aesthetica | | A woman in her 30s hopes to recapture a sense of self that was lost during the social media stardom of her teen years by undergoing a high-risk procedure called Aesthetica. | |
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 | Page to Screen |
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