This week, I talk with Marjan Kamali about her beautiful novel about friendship, The Lion Women of Tehran. We dive into how the book covers the nature of childhood friendships, the vast spectrum of being a Lion Woman, and the jarring aftermath of women losing their rights almost overnight to religious fundamentalists in Iran.

The Lion Women of Tehran Synopsis

In 1950s Tehran, seven-year-old Ellie lives in grand comfort until the untimely death of her father, forcing Ellie and her mother to move to a tiny home downtown. Lonely and bearing the brunt of her mother’s endless grievances, Ellie dreams of a friend to alleviate her isolation.

Luckily, on the first day of school, she meets Homa, a kind, passionate girl with a brave and irrepressible spirit. Together, the two girls play games, learn to cook in the stone kitchen of Homa’s warm home, wander through the colorful stalls of the Grand Bazaar, and share their ambitions for becoming “lion women.”

But their happiness is disrupted when Ellie and her mother are afforded the opportunity to return to their previous bourgeois life. Now a popular student at the best girls’ high school in Iran, Ellie’s memories of Homa begin to fade. Years later, however, her sudden reappearance in Ellie’s privileged world alters the course of both of their lives.

Together, the two young women come of age and pursue their own goals for meaningful futures. But as the political turmoil in Iran builds to a breaking point, one earth-shattering betrayal will have enormous consequences.

This week, Gare, Steph and I share books to read if the sleazy, sexy, toxic, dark academia of Tell Me Lies has you in a chokehold!

Books We Talked About

Ladykiller

We Love the Night Life

Only If You’re Lucky

An Academy for Liars

A Lovely Lie

The Favorite Sister

None of This Is True

Like You Hate Me

Emily Layden joins me to talk about her new contemporary fiction novel Once More From The Top! We dive into her inspiration for the book, and our shared obsession with the many facets of fame.

Once More From The Top Synopsis

Everyone in America knows Dylan Read, or at least has heard her music. Since releasing her debut album her senior year of high school, Dylan’s spent fifteen years growing up in the public eye. She’s not only perfected her skills when it comes to lyrics and melody; she’s also learned how to craft a public narrative that satisfies her fans, her label, and the media. In the circles of fame and celebrity in which she now travels, the careful maintenance of Dylan Read pop star is often more important than the songs themselves.

And so lots of people think they understand everything about Dylan Read. But what no one knows is the part of her origin story she has successfully kept hidden: her childhood best friend Kelsey vanished the year before Dylan became famous. Now, as Dylan’s at the height of her career, Kelsey’s body is found at the bottom of their hometown lake—forcing Dylan to reckon with their shared past, her friend’s influence on her music, and whether there’s more to their story than meets the eye.

This week, Caileigh Hynes @thebookpear joins me and shares 5 of her favorite reads in 2024 so far! We dive into what we love about thrillers, how she started her account, and our matching pet names!

Books We Talked About

Kill for Me Kill for You

The Return of Ellie Black

Look Closer

She’s Not Sorry

Murder Road

This week, I talk with Hannah D Sharpe about her new domestic suspense Between Lies and Revenge. We dive into how she learned about gemology, her experiences with MLMs, and found family.

Between Lies and Revenge Synopsis

Years after the death of her brother and the theft of her heirloom jewelry, ex-con Elle is on the run ... until she spots a stranger wearing a signature piece. Determined to take back what is hers, Elle stalks and befriends the woman, using her gemology skills as a ruse. Elle offers to appraise and clean the jewelry, replicating and replacing the pieces instead.

Olivia is drowning. She maxes out credit cards behind her financially-strict husband's back in order to pay for fertility treatments, keep her blackmailing father at bay, and maintain appearances with her wealthy friends and their cultist MLM social circles. When Olivia meets Elle, she finally feels understood ... and inspired.

With Elle’s expertise and Olivia’s connections, the two start a side-hustle by way of home jewelry appraisal parties. When this isn't lucrative enough, they develop the perfect con: switching rich housewives’ gems with fakes. But their hidden truths get in the way of their success, and each other. Before their secrets bury them, they must confess their lies to one another and trust their final con will exact the revenge that’ll secure their freedom, and their lives.

This week, I got to talk with Chelsea Bieker about her powerful emotional suspense novel Madwoman. We dive into the story's exploration of motherhood, traumatic childhoods, coping mechanisms, anxiety and integration.

Madwoman Synopsis

The world is not made for mothers.
Yet mothers made the world…

Clove has gone to extremes to keep her past a secret. Thanks to her lies, she’s landed the life of her dreams, complete with a safe husband and two adoring children who will never know the terror that was routine in her own childhood. If her buried anxiety threatens to breach the surface, Clove (if that is really her name) focuses on finding the right supplement, the right gratitude meditation.

But when she receives a letter from a women’s prison in California, her past comes screeching into the present, entangling her in a dangerous game with memory and the people she thought she had outrun. As we race between her precarious present-day life in Portland, Oregon and her childhood in a Waikiki high-rise with her mother and father, Clove is forced to finally unravel the defining day of her life. How did she survive that day, and what will it take to end the cycle of violence? Will the truth undo her, or could it ultimately save her?

This week, I got to talk with Jeffery Deaver and Isabella Maldonado about their new action thriller Fatal Intrusion. We dive into their joint writing process, the inception of the story, and creating a killer obsessed with spiders.

Fatal Intrusion Synopsis

Carmen Sanchez is a tough Homeland Security agent who plays by the rules. But when her sister is attacked, revealing a connection to a series of murders across Southern California, she realizes a conventional investigation will not be enough to stop the ruthless perpetrator.

With nowhere else to turn, Sanchez enlists the aid of Professor Jake Heron, a brilliant and quirky private security expert who, unlike Sanchez, believes rules are merely suggestions. The two have a troubled past, but he owes her a favor and she’s cashing in. They team up to catch the assailant, who, mystifyingly, has no discernable motive and fits no classic criminal profile. All they have to go on is a distinctive tattoo and a singular obsession that gives this chillingly efficient tactician his nickname: Spider.

Over the next seventy-two hours, Sanchez and Heron find themselves in the midst of a lethal chess match with the killer as they race to stop the carnage. As the victims mount, so do the risks. Because this spider’s web of intrigue is more sinister—and goes far deeper—than anyone could possibly anticipate.

This week, MacKenzie Green joins the show, and we talk about our shared love for reading, how reading expands empathy, and five books that define her reading style!

Books We Talked About

Creativity, Inc.

My Government Means to Kill Me

The Immortalists

Wordslut

The Swimmers