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Lisa Jewell on writing bad guys, those twist endings and when her books will hit Netflix
Closed-door affairs. Manipulative protagonists. Eerie disappearances. Gruesome murders.
These are the unsettling hallmarks of a Lisa Jewell novel, but not of the woman behind the books. The 'None of This is True' author may write some of the darkest stories on your bookshelf, but unlike her characters, she's notoriously optimistic and a 'terrible liar,' she says.
It's surprising, given how sinister her books are. Jewell has a cult following of thriller readers, writing some of the genre's best twist endings. But her sunny outlook on life is exactly why she loves writing psychological thrillers. She loves to get inside the head of someone completely different from her, she tells USA TODAY.
Jewell pitched her first novel, 'Ralph's Party,' as a psychological thriller, but, being young and in love in London, it manifested as a romance. Through her next few pastel-book-covered romances, readers kept remarking how surprisingly dark the material was.
'I was really pushing a little bit against the genre, not wanting it to be too saccharine and too feel good and too sweet. I was tucking quite a lot of dark stuff away in those books,' Jewell says. 'Then I got older, my career changed, my editor changed and I just sort of thought, 'OK, it's time, I think, to start killing people.''
Readers can expect plenty of that in her latest, 'Don't Let Him In' (out now from Simon & Schuster).
New Lisa Jewell inspired by 'Who TF Did I Marry?', social media sleuthing
In 'Don't Let Him In,' several women collide over one shady but seemingly-perfect man. At the heart of the story is Nina Swann and her adult daughter, Ash, both grieving the recent murder of husband and father Paddy. Nina receives condolences from an old friend of his, finding herself unexpectedly swept off her feet by this new, enchanting man. Nina is compelled, but Ash is concerned. Meanwhile, in a neighboring town, florist and young mother Martha tries to solve the mystery of her disappearing husband, whose 'work' absences stretch longer and longer each week.
'Don't Let Him In' reads like a cautionary 'Who TF Did I Marry' clip or a post from a cheater-exposing Facebook page, but with more secrets, bodies and beachside ruminations. True crime and TikTok sleuthing inspired Jewell, who is fascinated by toxic 'flighty and non-existent' men who 'float away in the slightest gusts of wind and just leave no trace.' Jewell thought it high time for some consequences.
'Where are these men in these stories and these podcasts and these documentaries? Where are they? They never find them, they never talk to them, and I know that's why I just wanted to pin one down,' Jewell says. 'I just wanted to pin one down on the page and just get him down there and get into his head and find out what made him tick.'
As emotionally abusive partners do, Jewell had to spin a web of lies and excuses to gaslight her female characters. Though she admits she's not a good liar, Jewell said it was easier to come up with plausible explanations for shady behavior than she expected.
Part of it comes from personal experience.
Jewell has spoken publicly about her ex-husband she called a 'coercive controller' in a 2024 interview with the Telegraph. And while she tells USA TODAY no character is based on her ex-husband, her experience being in a relationship of 'low-level gaslighting' and 'control' gave her empathy for her female characters.
'Five years of my life … really gave me an understanding of what it's like to take the wrong corner and let the wrong person in, so I'm always writing about that,' Jewell says.
How Lisa Jewell crafts those shocking endings
Another hallmark of a Lisa Jewell novel? It'll keep you guessing right up until the very end.
'Getting that ending right' is key, says Jewell, who wants her books to be accessible and still leave you feeling breathless. Jewell is a big thriller reader herself, and it gives her a healthy sense of competition.
'(It) makes me feel very, very ambitious for my endings, makes me want my endings to be better than other people's endings,' Jewell says. 'Those closing moments of reading a thriller can sometimes just slip away, because it's all about sort of ticking boxes and explaining this, explain that, and then you get to the end. … I want my readers to finish the book and feel something. I want to either feel uncomfortable or to feel emotional.'
The ending of 'Don't Let Him In' took her a few tries to get right, but she hopes it'll leave her readers feeling both.
I ask her if she's ever as haunted by her books as her readers are (I, for one, am still pondering the end of 'None of This is True'). Never, she says, until recently. Her next book is 'really weird' and 'creepy,' and she was battling what she thought was the end of a summer cold while writing it. But the second she finished the book, she felt better.
'This book was having an effect on me, it was making me feel uncomfortable,' Jewell says, and both of us grimace, partly out of excitement for future twists in store. 'That's never happened to me writing a book before, and it's affected my mood, it's affected my psyche.'
'None of This is True,' 'Then She Was Gone' movie updates
Yes – as well as 'Then She Was Gone.' Netflix will develop a movie version of 'None of This is True,' Deadline first reported in 2024. It's moving the fastest of any other planned adaptations, Jewell says, though it's still early stages.
'I want to get excited, but experience has taught me that it's better just to be patient and wait and it will happen,' Jewell says. 'At one point in my very, very long career, I will get to see something that I've written appear on a screen. When that will happen, I don't know, but currently we're quite close.'
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Clare Mulroy is USA TODAY's Books Reporter, where she covers buzzy releases, chats with authors and dives into the culture of reading. Find her on Instagram, subscribe to our weekly Books newsletter or tell her what you're reading at cmulroy@
