Everything After: Jill Santopolo with Donna Freitas (VIRTUAL EVENT)

We will be presenting this event virtually, using Zoom. RSVP here.

Jill Santopolo’s page-turning first novel for adults, The Light We Lost, struck a deep chord with readers around the world, becoming a New York Times and international bestseller and earning a spot as a Reese Witherspoon Book Club pick. Jill’s much-anticipated second novel, More Than Words was tagged “A smart, sexy, delicious novel” by People Magazine, earning her the title of “a true master of matters of the heart” (Taylor Jenkins Reid). True to form, Jill is back with another emotionally taut and enticing tale of love, passion, and the power of choice.

In Everything After, Emily has come a long way since she lost her two passions fifteen years ago: music, and Rob. She's a psychologist at NYU who helps troubled college students like the one she once was. Together with her caring doctor husband, Ezra, she has a beautiful life. They've never been happier and hope to start a family. But when a tragic event in Emily's present too closely echoes her past, parts of her story that she'd hoped to keep buried come to light. Her perfect life is suddenly upended. Then Emily hears a song on the radio about the woman who got away—and the melody and voice are hauntingly familiar…Could it be? As Emily's past passions come roaring back into her life, she'll find herself asking: Who is she meant to be? Who is she meant to love?

As with Jill’s previous novels, this new novel was born out of empathy and a desire to stand in solidarity with those around her: “My recent wedding has had me thinking a lot about marriage—about the things we know about our spouses and the things we don’t, and about how people change as they grow and what that means in a relationship. I’ve also been talking with a few close friends who had miscarriages in the past few years, and realized that there aren’t many books that talk about that experience. My friends had commented to me that the loneliness and isolation of the experience was the hardest part, and as someone who writes books for and about women, I wanted to write something that would make them and other women who shared this experience feel less alone and more connected.”

In addition to The Light We Lost and More Than Words, Jill Santopolo is the author of three successful children's and young-adult series and works as the associate publisher of Philomel Books. Her work has been translated into more than thirty-five languages. Jill received a BA from Columbia University and an MFA from the Vermont College of Fine Arts. She lives in New York City and Washington, D.C.

The Nine Lives of Rose Napolitano is Donna Freitas's first adult novel. She has spoken at nearly two hundred colleges and universities about her nonfiction work. She is the author of Consent: A Memoir of Unwanted Attention, as well as ten novels for children and young adults. Donna has written for The Washington Post, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and The Boston Globe, and she has appeared on radio and television, from NPR's All Things Considered to The Today Show. She has been a professor at Boston University and Hofstra University, and is currently a member of the faculty at Fairleigh Dickinson University's MFA program.