15 hours ago
It's Not Summer Without Jenny Han: Bestselling Author Turned Mega-Hit Showrunner & Big Sister To Millions
Jenny Han at the Summer I Turned Pretty Season 3 Trailer Premiere
Growing up as a half Asian and Caucasian woman, I almost never saw myself represented—so when Jenny Han's To All The Boys trilogy came along, it was historic and personal; touted as one of the first mainstream romcoms to feature a Eurasian lead, it was an instant mega-hit and widened the scope of the spotlight on its author and executive producer.
The multi-hyphenate, award winning Jenny Han first garnered success as a Young Adult author of Summer I Turned Pretty trilogy of novels. Thanks to the show, released more than a decade later, the books have returned to NYT Bestsellers List in December 2022 and have stayed there ever since.
Her second trilogy, To All the Boys I've Loved Before, was also popular upon its release in 2014 and was the first to be adapted for the screen. In 2018, Netflix bought the rights to film the aforementioned teen trilogy—about private love letters gone rogue—starring Lana Condor and Noah Centineo, turning it into an international smash film franchise. It was then that Jenny went from author to a cultural figure. In 2023, Netflix extended its deal with Han to include the spinoff series from the All the Boys—XO, Kitty, which was just nominated for a Kids Choice Award this past week. Han admits that protagonist Kitty Song Covey is her favorite of the Covey girls and was inspired by her own little sister.
Following the success of the Netflix trilogy, Amazon Prime worked with Han to adapt The Summer I Turned Pretty love triangle trilogy into a three-season series - whose long-awaited strike-delayed final season will finally debut on July 16, 2025. The first two seasons had seismic reactions on social media platforms such as TikTok, with impressions in the billions, thousands of 'ship edit' videos, and countless fans begging the question: Team Conrad or Team Jeremiah? Or Swedish Fish or Sour Patch Kids? The debate was so popular that even the brands themselves weighed in. American Eagle's CMO, Craig Brommers, also boasted that its tie-in clothing campaign for the show was its most lucrative yet.
Before beginning the filming of the show's third and final season, Han was kind enough to sit down for a Zoom interview with me to talk about her transition from author to showrunner, her growing fanbase, and maintaining boundaries and self-care.
Han's inspiration in writing the Summer trilogy came from her time spent as a caretaker while getting her graduate degree in New York City, for a teenager named Claire (to whom she dedicated the book). She has said in a previous interview with Elle, she was drawn to that period of life when, 'You still feel like a kid, but you look different. The power that you wield can be frightening.'
Now that her Summer series has been published for over sixteen years, she expresses gratitude for having such a meaningful ongoing connection to a generation of readers. She says:
'People who were 10, 11, 12 years old back then are now working women, which is very cool, to really have the privilege of being a part of someone's young adulthood, and now to be a part of their journey as a young woman; it's really cool when I get messages like that. I feel very honored to continue to be a part of somebody's life.'
Han admits that while she is thrilled to have a whole new generation of readers introduced to her work and picking up her books, she is, 'trying to find ways to still feel connected to those OG readers who are there, because my social media has expanded and now I use it in a different way to where I'm like, there's so many new followers.'
'Before To All the Boys I've Loved Before and then definitely before the shows, when I was just writing the books, I really felt like I knew my readers and they knew me.'
What began as an intimate connection with fans has ballooned to 7.5 million followers between Instagram and TikTok. The increase in fans has changed how Han posts on socials and connects to her audience, saying, 'I think after XO, Kitty came out…I got like a million new followers in a couple of weeks and then it's a lot more people and I try to give just so much more content about the show than about me.'
Despite her growing platform, Jenny makes an effort to remain connected and accessible. For example, when she was resting in a hotel room after suffering from tree-related allergies while filming the second season of the Summer series, she used that time to connect with her Instagram followers—asking them to send in questions and interacting with fans. And when I suggested that her accessibility on social media might make people feel like they know her, she said:
'When people feel like they know me, they do. There are parts of my life that I do keep personal just to me, but I think the parts that I share really are very much me. And, if you feel like you know me, then you do.'
Jenny Han is impressive not only for her talent as a storyteller or her ability to juggle so many projects—but for how she continues to show up for a hungry public—not just the fans looking for show updates—but young people looking for comfort and for answers. She frequently makes herself available online to compassionately answer questions submitted by young fans such as: What should I do on a first date? What about my first kiss? Jenny also shares what delicious goods she's baking; she makes you want to have a heart-to-heart with her at Alice's Tea Cup over scones.
Han has blink-or-you'll-miss-it cameos in all her films and shows—a personal favorite is her sassy one-liner in XO, Kitty as a ticket agent in Season 1. Still, she seems to be more comfortable as the master behind the scenes. She is as in love with her characters, her cast, crew, and the story as much as the fandom and audience. Jenny Han is what my mom calls a 'quiet giant'—not one to hog the spotlight, preferring instead to shine it on those around her—but a force with colossal vision, talent, and influence nonetheless.
And though she has had a large audience on social media, Han does find it important to create boundaries; she shared that she left Twitter (now X) years before the recent mass exodus: 'I'm no longer on Twitter, which is good for me because I don't think it's good for me to know what everyone thinks about me at all times. That's like not a good place for me to be.'
With all the hard work and love she gives to others, Jenny has admitted that with greater responsibility and success, she has had to learn to become a better caretaker for herself: 'The past few years I've been really nonstop working on The Summer I Turned Pretty and XO, Kitty and I haven't been great with self-care. I think I've been juggling the two shows so there's not been much time for anything else. I'm lucky in that I really love the work, but I want to be able to continue to do the work, and in order to do that, you have to take time for yourself and protect your own emotional and mental health and really I think water your own garden. If you don't keep refueling that tank, you're gonna go empty.'
Jenny Han and the cast of Summer I Turned Pretty Season 3 at the Trailer Premiere in NYC
Han's transition from author with 'a lot of solitude' to showrunner in charge of working with teams and crew quickly elevated her to a boss and leader—a role she seems to relish. When asked about leadership, Han says you must have confidence in your choices and humility to trust the experts you've hired: 'I think a good leader is somebody who's decisive and is considerate. It's important to ask others for their opinions and their insights because you know you don't know everything, and that other people are there for a reason and they're experts. That's what I love so much about filmmaking is that everyone is sort of the sharpshooter of their particular field.'
When it comes to making decisions, Han has also embraced being steadfast yet quick to adapt, adding, 'I am pretty decisive and I tend to just say, 'let's go'. But then I also don't mind pivoting when things aren't working.'
Jenny is willing to make changes to her adaptations from book to screen but only within reason:
'I'll see the fans saying, 'Please don't kill Susanna,' or 'Please don't make Conrad be mean' or 'Please, change the ending.' But then I'll also see people saying, 'Why isn't it just like the books?' So I think people want it both ways—people want a happy ending and they don't want conflict, but then they also want it to be just like the book.' Han's wise response is that, 'A good story needs conflict,' and that grief is essential to the growth and conflict of every character in the Summer story.
And while the recently released trailer suggests there may be some changes in timeline, it also shows Han is sticking relatively closely to the source trying to meet the demands of fans and studio executives, Han has also learned to be a shepherd of her own process and stories amongst the noise, saying: 'I try to be protective of my own personal creativity. If I want to be able to take those creative swings and take chances and I follow my own instincts and do what I think is best for the story I have to really be able to listen to my own voice. When you write with the door wide open, then you're at risk of hearing other people's voices… I never have regrets when I follow my own heart…When I don't follow my own heart and my own conscience and I'm listening to others, I don't fully agree with something…I end up regretting it later…it's maybe the wrong decision at the time, but at least I can have that integrity…So I always give that advice to other authors as well—to do what you have to do to protect the author's personal peace.'
This advice is poignant considering that early in Han's career she was pressured to write Belly, the protagonist from the Summer series, as a white character. It wasn't until she had offers to make the book into a series that she was able to fight to ensure the main character was Eurasian, as she had always envisioned. Once an established author, she also stood her ground when film studios pressured her to make the To All the Boys protagonist Lara Jean, a white character. And by standing her ground she was able to foster much-needed representation.
NEW YORK, NEW YORK - JUNE 16: Jenny Han and Lola Tung attend cocktail party with women in media and ... More entertainment hosted by Author and Showrunner Jenny Han for the launch of Prime Video's 'The Summer I Turned Pretty' on June 16, 2022, in New York, NY. (Photo byfor Phenomenal Media)
Her stories and her shows are for all ages. While teenage love is central to her stories, Han's production company, Jenny Kissed Me, carries the tagline 'Coming of age, at any age,' and she includes multigenerational complex relationships in her work—pivotal transitional moments in mid-age adulthood and parenting such as: divorce, death, becoming empty nesters.
As someone who straddles the line herself between Gen X and Millennial, Jenny's shows hold a nostalgia for her own teenhood while also reflecting hopes and ideals for the next generation of teens. Jenny Han is the big sister we all wish we had—introducing us to the music and movies of her teenhood while gently assuring us that everything is going to be okay. She gives us both a fantasy and reality in the pain, joy, and heartbreak of life that we all experience, and carefully-crafted multigenerational musical choices for Summer, which include everything from Smashing Pumpkins and Fleetwood Mac to Taylor Swift and Olivia Rodrigo.
Like many of us who didn't experience certain things in our own teens, she's creating the teenhood she never had—and in doing so, she's connecting us all to our teenhood and ideals. She's not just a showrunner; she's a fan of the stories she creates and of the cast and crew who bring them to life. During production, she takes ample BTS footage because, as a fan herself, she understands what the fans want. She seems deeply in tune with them. By making herself available to her followers online, she is a source of encouragement and empathy—because she understands how wonderful and difficult growing up is.
What makes Jenny rare is her dedication to pleasing her fans while honoring her own creative directive. She's attuned to what we need as an audience, and her big-sister energy fills a role perhaps she once needed herself—to tell her to take risks, put herself out there, and trust her instincts; And in being a good steward to her stories and the people who need them; she now has 7.5 million Claires she's caring for - and who I believe, even if they fight some of her choices, care for her, too.
Ultimately, it's the soul-deep bonds that Jenny Han seems most interested in forging. In PS: I Still Love You, the protagonist Lara Jean Covey shares:
'There's a Korean word my grandma taught me. It's called jung. It's the connection between two people that can't be severed, even when love turns to hate. You still have those old feelings for them; you can't ever completely shake them loose of you; you will always have tenderness in your heart for them.'
This theme of jung is present in The Summer I Turned Pretty series, too—most notably nodded to as Conrad and Belly frolic on a snow-flurry-filled beach as Taylor Swift's 'Invisible String' plays. Arguably the truest and most profound expression of jung in the Summer series is the sisterhood between two moms and childhood friends, Laurel and Susanna, whose friendship is the foundation of the entire story. Jung is also present in Jenny Han's real life, displayed through the tenderness she has for her characters, cast, crew, and fans—a passionate, opinionated public.
As she says in the aforementioned Elle profile, 'I believe that there is hope, so of course I put it in my stories.' For me though, Jenny Han's not-so-secret ingredient is her heart—the love she bakes into her characters, gives to her cast and crew, and serves to her audience that looks to her for sisterly comfort and wisdom. To those enduring life's difficulties, she offers that warm summer feeling that anything is possible and the sense that Jenny has our back.
