Callie Austin, the unknown author of the wildly popular Tex Miller book series, decides twenty-plus years of living in anonymity is enough. Her plan? Kill the beloved Tex Miller. But with a fierce agent, a cut-throat editor, and a beyond-zealous fan base, Callie knows not everyone will be happy. And just wait until Tex hears about it.

At twenty-two, Callie, orphaned and grieving, conjured Tex Miller, a dashing adventurer, a now-adored literary character who makes women swoon and men sit up straighter. Her novel skyrocketed, but Callie was lucky. It was the mid-1990s, pre-internet explosion, and much to her publisher’s chagrin, she insisted she remain anonymous by using a pen name. The enigmatic Calliope Jones was born and cloistered away in one fell swoop, leaving an idolizing public scratching its collective head. Visible only to her, Tex Miller became her constant screwball companion.

Two decades and a dozen books later, on a routine trip to NYC, Callie plans to end the Tex Miller saga, but an up-and-coming streaming service’s offer to turn Callie’s books into an original series may waylay Tex’s demise. Things spiral further when her trusted longtime driver falls ill, and a young replacement chauffeur catches her eye—and maybe her heart, while Tex goes rogue, unsure he’s down with the new plot twists.

Throw in a dogged gossip blog’s rabid pursuit of ‘the truth’ along with Calliope Jones’s fervent fandom, and poor Callie Austin has her hands full.

A catastrophe forces Jocelyn Durand, the author of a decades-old and quite accidental publishing one-hit-wonder, to meet her idol, best-selling suspense writer Asher Cray. Each harbors a literary crush on the other, but if gossip rags are to be believed, Asher is a philandering charmer and more than the naïve Jocelyn could ever hope to handle. Still, while social media has labeled him a notorious Lothario, they might have the story all wrong. Regardless, those rumors are the least of Asher’s worries compared to the horrific case of writer’s block hounding him.

Sparks fly between the two would-be wordsmiths, but uprooted nightmarish memories and a revolving door of uninvited visitors create plot twists no one sees coming, threatening the pairs’ less-than-storybook romance and upending the Durand siblings’ long-held beliefs. Happily-ever-after means the insulated Jocelyn and her stalwart sister must confront a wiped-away past, recognizing monsters come in unexpected forms, and maybe they aren’t all bad—a daunting task one wickedly hot Hamptons summer in a very crowded house when everyone’s personal histories blur the lines between fact and fiction.