Dear Reader,
Having my debut adult novel chosen as the Reese’s Book Club January 2024 pick was a gamechanger! After ten years as an author and six published books, I hit the New York Times bestseller list for the first time. First Lie Wins sold one million copies in combined formats within eight months of publication. It was an overwhelmingly incredible experience.
So, what was it like sitting down to write my next book?
Hard. Extremely hard.
Anatomy of an Alibi will be my eighth published book but in a lot of ways, it felt like my first. I overthought everything. I second-guessed every choice, every character, every plot point. I rewrote it three times, making drastic changes with every draft. I worried that I would disappoint every reader who had loved First Lie Wins because I didn’t know how anything I ever wrote could follow that kind of success.
Now, all of this pressure was completely self-inflicted! My agent and editors and critique partners assured me the pages I sent them were good, but my inner critic was louder than any other voice around me. There was a moment last spring where I had to make a decision: Let that noise in my head get the best of me or trust the story I was trying to tell, trust that I was the one to tell it.
I’m proud of every book I’ve written but there will always be a special place in my heart for Anatomy of an Alibi because it’s the one I was most scared to write. I’m so tremendously pleased with the final version and so excited for readers to discover it. All feelings I thought impossible a year ago!
Anatomy of an Alibi is a story about swapped identities, small-town drama, family secrets and putting your trust in a stranger. It’s full of twists and turns, set in South Louisiana, with multiple timelines and POVs. I hope you love it as much as I do.
– Ashley
