Tune in at 7pm ET for TONIGHT’s episode!
Join us Wednesday, August 7th at 7pm Eastern on the F&F Facebook page and YouTube channel as Mary Kay Andrews and Patti Callahan Henry welcome New York Times bestselling author Rhys Bowen to discuss THE ROSE ARBOR, her haunting new novel of suspense which follows an investigation into a girl’s disappearance that uncovers a mystery dating back to World War II.
Rhys Bowen has authored two historical mystery series, the #1 Kindle bestseller In Farleigh Field, and numerous other international bestsellers. Her work has sold close to 10-million copies in more than 30 languages. She’s been nominated for every major mystery award and has won multiple Agatha, Anthony, and Macavity Awards. Her childhood experiences with relatives in Wales colored her first mystery series about Constable Evans in the mountains of Snowdonia. She went on to write ten books in that series including the Edgar nominee Evan’s Gate. We are eager to hear from her about THE ROSE ARBOR which The Extraordinary Life of Sam Hell author Robert Dugoni has called “a complex and intriguing mystery…with smart, exquisite prose.”
Watch the video broadcast of this show as it airs Wed 8/7 at 7pm ET on the F&F Facebook group page & YouTube channel. Catch the audio version on our podcast Fri 8/9.
Pre-order Rhys’s book on Bookshop.org!
Shop all of our guests’ & hosts’ books in our F&F Shop on Bookshop.org!
Upgrade to our PAID Subscription for bonus Q&A’s with our guest authors which include a writing tip, book recommendation, and information about their works-in-progress, plus other great material not covered on the show!
KRISTY WOODSON HARVEY is so, so, so excited because A HAPPIER LIFE is the August The Happy Place read! The Happy Place is Sweet Magnolias and Reba star Joanna Garcia Swisher’s beautiful corner of the internet. If you haven’t checked it out yet, don’t miss it! She is catching up on work during a lot of inside time from this storm this week and beginning her 2026 book. Yay!
What Kristy is reading and why she’s loving it: Greer Macallister’s The Thirteenth Husband. Oh my word! This book! Aimee Crocker is the most fascinating woman, and Greer has told her story so exquisitely. I have so much to ask Greer when she joins us on an upcoming episode of Friends & Fiction. Don’t miss this one!
PATTI CALLAHAN HENRY is catching up on work and trying to stay out of the heat! Today she leaves for her first Pre-Pub event for The Story She Left Behind in Washington, DC for our beloved southern independent bookseller’s trade show. She’ll see her son, visit museums, and go to a dear friend’s wedding. Meanwhile, she is writing a photo journal for The Story She Left Behind and can’t wait to share it all with you.
What Patti is reading and why she’s loving it: The Night We Lost Him by Laura Dave. “MKA and I will be interviewing her in a few weeks and I picked up the book this weekend to “skim” and could not put it down! What an incredible ride along with Dave’s signature heartfelt understandings of love and forgiveness.”
KRISTIN HARMEL had an unintentionally whirlwind weekend; she spent Saturday in Jacksonville (Florida) with her husband, son, and in-laws, and then they all drove up to Savannah on Sunday for a family reunion. She had a great dinner with 20 family members on Sunday night, and then she woke up early Monday to the realization that there were multiple flood warnings in place (as well as a curfew for the city implemented later in the day), due to the approaching Tropical Storm Debby. So Kristin, her husband and son, and her in-laws, packed up in about ten minutes flat and drove several hours home in the pounding rain and whistling winds of the storm’s feeder bands…and they all felt so, so sad to miss the remainder of family reunion. On the upside, she also went to Buc-ee’s for the first time (WHAT EVEN IS THAT PLACE????) and turned in the revised manuscript for her 2025 book, so she hopes to be able to tell you more about that (including a title – which is still being finalized) very soon! Also, saving the best news for last, Kristin–along with Patti, Kristy, Mary Kay, Meg, and Ron–is so excited for Lisa Harrison and Brenda Gardner of the Friends & Fiction Official Book Club with Brenda and Lisa, who won the award for Book Club of the Year (!!!!!) at this year’s AAMBC (African Americans on the Move Book Club) Literary Awards show over the weekend! We are so proud of Lisa (who accepted the award wearing the most gorgeous green dress) and Brenda (who was there in spirit!) for this wonderful (and well-deserved) honor.
What Kristin is reading and why she’s loving it: I Need You to Read This (by our August guest Jessa Maxwell) and Sandwich (by Catherine Newman). I read both books over the delightfully lazy early part of the weekend, before we made our mad, panicked dash home on Monday (at which point I was too frazzled and tired to read anything but Google Maps, as it routed us around crashes and road hazards)! I Need You to Read This was definitely a page turner, and I’m looking forward to chatting with Jessa about it in just two weeks on this month’s live Friends & Fiction show. And now I understand what all the wonderful buzz about Sandwich was all about…. It’s definitely a book that had me laughing, tearing up, and nodding empathetically along.
MARY KAY ANDREWS and her husband escaped the heat of Atlanta with a delightful week-long vacay on the coast of Maine. They stayed in inns and small hotels and loved visiting Bath, Bar Harbor, Portland and Kennebunkport. Mr. MKA enjoyed dining on lobster, clam chowder and haddock, while MKA binged on blueberry everything. They toured Acadia National Park, hiked around the Abby Aldrich Rockefeller botanical garden, and marveled at the beauty of summer in New England.
What MKA is reading and why she’s loving it: The Berry Pickers by Amanda Peters. Set in the blueberry fields of Maine, this is a haunting story of how indigenous families’ lives are marginalized and erased. A four-year-old little girl arrives with her family in Maine for a summer of blueberry picking. When she vanishes, without a trace, her disappearance leaves ripples of trauma for generations to come. Amanda Peters’ debut novel is a triumph.
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Friday, September 27 — An F&F Live event to benefit Earlier.org at High Point Country Club in High Point, NC. Details & ticketing info to come.
Sunday, September 29 — An F&F Live brunch event at the Bookmarks Festival of Books & Authors in Winston-Salem, NC. Details & ticketing info to come.
Wednesday, November 6, 6pm ET — Join all four founders and hosts of Friends & Fiction—along with Meg Walker & Ron Block—together in-person at the Grand Bohemian Hotel in Orlando, FL for a unique fundraising event benefiting the Florida Cancer Specialists (FCS) Foundation which will include a reception over cocktails and hors d’oeuvres, an intimate presentation, book sales, and an autograph session. Get tickets HERE.
Thursday, November 7 — An F&F Live afternoon tea event hosted by the Amelia Island Book Festival at The Ritz-Carlton in Amelia Island, FL. Details & ticketing info to come.
Want to know what these F&F Live events are all about? Watch this video compilation!
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On last week’s episode of The Friends & Fiction Show, Patti Callahan Henry and Kristin Harmel welcomed award-winning, internationally bestselling author Marjan Kamali to discuss her new national bestseller, THE LION WOMEN OF TEHRAN, a heartfelt, epic novel of friendship, betrayal, and redemption set against three transformative decades in Tehran, Iran. Order Marjan’s book from the F&F Shop on Bookshop.org, where you’ll also find books by all our hosts and guests, all at a discount—and where all your purchases support our show and our beloved indie bookstores nationwide!
You can WATCH that episode on Facebook or YouTube, or LISTEN to it on our podcast.
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: Killer Author Club (Kimberly Belle, Heather Gudenkauf & Kaira Rouda)
WATCH now! | LISTEN now!
Already aired: Christina Dodd, A Daughter of Fair Verona
WATCH now! | LISTEN now!
Already aired: F&F Pick of the Month: Jamie Brenner, A Novel Summer
WATCH now! | LISTEN now!
Already aired: Emily Giffin, The Summer Pact
WATCH now! | LISTEN now!
Already aired: Marjan Kamali, The Lion Women of Tehran
WATCH now! | LISTEN now!
Rhys Bowen, The Rose Arbor
Watch: August 7 | Listen: August 9
Greer Macallister, The Thirteenth Husband
Watch: August 14 | Listen: August 16
F&F Pick of the Month: Jessa Maxwell, I Need You to Read This
Watch: August 21 | Listen: August 23
Madeline Martin, The Booklover's Library
Watch: August 28 | Listen: August 30
TJ Klune, Somewhere Beyond the Sea
Watch: September 4 | Listen: September 6
Laura Dave, The Night We Lost Him
Watch: September 11 | Listen: September 13
F&F Pick of the Month: Jodi Picoult, By Any Other Name
Watch LIVE: September 18 | Listen: September 20
Liane Moriarty, Here One Moment
Watch: September 25 | Listen: September 27
The Fab Four (along with Meg & Ron) are taking turns interviewing some additional authors in short video segments we are calling “Behind the Book.” Check out a few recent bonus interviews that we’ve run on the F&F YouTube channel!
WATCH Kristy’s interview with Gilmore Girls star Devon Sorvari, who is also the voice of Keaton in the audiobook version of A HAPPIER LIFE.
WATCH Kristin’s interview with Erika Robuck about her new highly-anticipated WWII historical novel, The Last Twelve Miles.
WATCH Kristin & Kristy’s interview with Lisa Barr about her new highly-anticipated WWII historical novel, The Goddess of Warsaw.
WATCH Kristin’s conversation with Christina Lauren about their brand-new instant NYT-bestselling hit The Paradise Problem.
WATCH MKA’s conversation with the award-winning voice artist Kathleen McInerney who narrates the Summers at the Saint audiobook.
WATCH Patti & MKA’s interview with Sheila Roberts about her newest The Best Life Book Club.
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.
The four hosts & founders of Friends & Fiction are thrilled to congratulate Brenda Gardner and Lisa Harrison, who run the Friends & Fiction Book Club with Brenda & Lisa, which was just named the Book Club of the Year by the AAMBC (African Americans on the Move Book Club)! Lisa accepted the award at the ceremony in Atlanta; you can see her acceptance speech (and join the book club if you're not already a member!) here. (Congratulations also to Annissa Armstrong, Amber Prater, and Molly Neville, who are very involved in running the book club alongside Brenda and Lisa!)
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 30k 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 Katherine Center about her novel, The Rom-Commers. Mark your calendars for August 19th for their next author guest, Kristy Woodson Harvey, when they’ll discuss her novel, A Happier Life. With the help of Annissa Armstrong, the Book Club is also hosting the 2024 F&F Reading Challenge. Join them for a different category prompt each month to read outside your comfort zone. The July prompt is to read a book from a Little Free Library (bonus if you take a book and leave one!) and the August prompt is to read a book that inspired a TV show or movie.
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Shop our guests’ & hosts’ books in our shop on BOOKSHOP.
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