Meet Jess Walter TONIGHT!
Weekly News from Friends & Fiction—June 25, 2025
Tune in at 7pm ET for TONIGHT’s episode!
Join us Wednesday, June 25th at 7pm Eastern on the F&F Facebook page and YouTube channel as Patti Callahan Henry & Ron Block welcome #1 New York Times bestselling author Jess Walter to discuss his propulsive new novel So Far Gone, a hilarious, empathetic, and brilliantly provocative adventure through life in modern America, about a reclusive journalist forced back into the world to rescue his kidnapped grandchildren.
Jess Walter is the author of eleven books published in 34 languages. His other novels include the #1 New York Times bestseller Beautiful Ruins and the NEA Big Read, The Cold Millions; The Zero, finalist for the National Book Award; and Citizen Vince, winner of the Edgar Award. His short fiction, collected in The Angel of Rome and We Live in Water, has won the O. Henry Prize, the Pushcart Prize and appeared three times in Best American Short Stories. He joins us from his hometown of Spokane, Washington to discuss So Far Gone, which has received wall-to-wall starred reviews and been named to best-of and most-anticipated lists by Vogue, Amazon, the Washington Post, the LA Times, the New York Times, and Oprah’s Book Club among others.
Watch the video broadcast of this interview as it airs Wed 6/25 at 7pm ET on the F&F Facebook group page & YouTube channel. Catch the audio version on our podcast Fri 6/27.
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Latest News from the Fab Four!
PATTI CALLAHAN HENRY loved talking to Jess Walter this week about his new book, so she hopes you’ll tune in! Patti has finally returned home after a week in NJ up and down the shoreline for incredible events touring for The Story She Left Behind. Now it’s time for writing and then a big family reunion heading into the weekend.
KRISTY WOODSON HARVEY had the best, best last week on the Beach House Rules tour seeing lots of readers and hanging with the F&F crew-and then the best weekend celebrating her little cousin’s wedding with all her family! It’s Old Homes Tour week in Beaufort, and she is so excited to have events with Dawn Tripp and Marshall Watson. The Beach House Rules fun continues!
KRISTIN HARMEL cannot BELIEVE the extraordinary first week she had on tour for The Stolen Life of Colette Marceau… she was absolutely thrilled to see so many of you on the road and was especially happy to spend her launch day with Mary Kay, Kristy, Patti, Meg, and Ron at Booktowne on the Jersey Shore (Meg’s ‘hood!). Special thanks to author pals Lisa Unger, Jamie Brenner, Colleen Oakley, Sarah Penner, James Ponti and Shara Moon for being such awesome week one conversation partners! (And sympathy for MKA and KWH who had to hear my spiel twice!) I'm at An Unlikely Story in Massachusetts tonight, Greenville (SC) tomorrow, then off to California (LA, Carlsbad, San Diego) on Friday for a long weekend! Come see me on tour if you can! And finally, thanks to everyone who picked up a copy of The Stolen Life of Colette Marceau this week!
MARY KAY ANDREWS loved helping Kristin launch The Stolen Life of Colette Marceau in tandem with pal Colleen Oakley on Friday at The Atlanta History Center, before departing earrrrly the next morning for Austin, Texas, for a fun event at Book People in partnership with Visit Port Aransas’s fun beach reads promotion. The best part—aside from the delivery of warm Tiff’s Treats cookies sent by a sweet fan—was book shopping at one of the best indie bookstores in the country, coming away with no fewer than six new summer reads for her grandkids, along with a Keep Austin Weird tee shirt. She left lots of signed copies of Summers at the Saint behind, then winged her way back to Atlanta, where she’s finally back to working on next summer’s book—while listening to a new playlist of traditional Irish music. Galway Girl, anyone?
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Upcoming Events
View Kristin’s full 2025 book tour for The Stolen Life of Colette Marceau HERE.
View Kristy’s upcoming events HERE.
See Patti’s upcoming events HERE.
See MKA’s upcoming events HERE.
Want to know what our F&F Live events are all about? Watch this video compilation!
In Case You Missed It
On last week’s episode of The Friends & Fiction Show, Mary Kay Andrews & Kristy Woodson Harvey welcomed New York Times bestselling author Julie Clark to discuss her dazzling new thriller, The Ghostwriter.
You can WATCH that episode on Facebook or YouTube, or LISTEN to it on our podcast.
Coming Up on The Friends & Fiction Show
All shows can be watched on Facebook & YouTube each Wednesday evening at 7pm ET, and listened to on our podcast each Friday, all year long.
Already aired: F&F March Pick of the Month: Patti Callahan Henry, The Story She Left Behind
WATCH now! | LISTEN now!
Already aired: Emma Donoghue, The Paris Express
WATCH now! | LISTEN now!
Already aired: Emilia Hart, The Sirens
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Already aired: Nita Prose, The Maid’s Secret
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Already aired: Dolen Perkins-Valdez, Happy Land
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Already aired: F&F April Pick of the Month—Jeneva Rose, The Perfect Divorce
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Already aired: Jasmine Guillory, Flirting Lessons
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Already aired: Carley Fortune, One Golden Summer
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Already aired: Mary Alice Monroe, Where the Rivers Merge
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Already aired: Ruth Reichl, The Paris Novel
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Already aired: F&F May Pick of the Month—Kristy Woodson Harvey, Beach House Rules
WATCH now! | LISTEN now!
Already aired: Kristina McMorris, The Girls of Good Fortune
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Already aired: Summer Kick-Off Beach Party with Mary Kay Andrews, Annabel Monaghan, Meg Mitchell Moore, Martha Hall Kelly, Wendy Francis, Amy Mason Doan & Brooke Lea Foster
WATCH now! | LISTEN now!
Already aired: F&F June Pick of the Month—Kristin Harmel, The Stolen Life of Collette Marceau
WATCH now! | LISTEN now!
Already aired: Julie Clark, The Ghostwriter
WATCH now! | LISTEN now!
Jess Walter, So Far Gone
Watch June 25 | Listen June 27
Stay tuned for the reveal of our Summer 2025 (July-September) guest line-up!
F&F 2025 Subscription Box with Oxford Exchange
The 2025 FRIENDS AND FICTION Subscription Box is available for purchase now, exclusively from our friends at Oxford Exchange.
This subscription includes three separate shipments:
1. MARCH 18th: A hardcover, signed, first edition of Patti Callahan Henry’s forthcoming book THE STORY SHE LEFT BEHIND with an exclusive Friends & Fiction friendship bracelet and car magnet
2. MAY 27th: A hardcover, signed, first edition of BEACH HOUSE RULES by Kristy Woodson Harvey!
3. JUNE 17th: A hardcover, signed, first edition of THE STOLEN LIFE OF COLETTE MARCEAU by Kristin Harmel!
*Optional add-on: A paperback, signed, first edition of SUMMERS AT THE SAINT by Mary Kay Andrews (coming in paperback June 3)!
Get your subscription NOW from Oxford Exchange!
F&F Merch Store
We have a Friends & Fiction merch store with t-shirts, sweatshirts, coffee mugs and a book bag on Bonfire. We also have other items like wine tumblers, reading journals, and our original white v-neck logo tees available through Oxford Exchange.
Tees in New Summer Colors!
We’ve added two fun, new summer colors to our Bonfire merch store in our signature Name List apparel line. These are perfect for attending Kristy & Kristin’s upcoming tour stops. How fun to dress to match the books?!
F&F Official Book Club & 2025 Reading Challenge
Join Brenda Gardner & Lisa Harrison for monthly book club picks and live online author chats on the Facebook page for the F&F Official Book Club with Brenda & Lisa, where they’ve amassed more than 38,000 of their own members. You can also follow the Book Club on Instagram and subscribe to their YouTube channel where you can catch past discussions, including their most recent chat with Kristy Woodson Harvey about her novel, Beach House Rules. Mark your calendars for July 21st for their next author guest, Kristin Harmel, when they’ll discuss her new novel, The Stolen Life of Colette Marceau. The Book Club is also hosting the 2025 F&F Reading Challenge. Join them for a different category prompt each month to read outside your comfort zone. The June prompt is to read a book recommended by a friend and for July it’s to read a book set in France.
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I hate that I am going to miss this, but I have my neighborhood book club tonight. I just finished So Far Gone and it was fantastic.
I just spoke with him last week. Love the new book!