The Fresh Fiction Podcast

Chelsea Conradt is a USA Today bestselling author whose books have been described as "a true mix of murder and kindness" — psychological horror thrillers with real emotional depth, a slow build of Gothic dread, and, somehow, room for a laugh. On this episode of the Fresh Fiction Video Book Club, she sits down with Samantha Tennant to talk about her latest novel, THE SECRET ATTIC, her debut THE FAR...

Former CIA analyst David McCloskey joins Samantha Tennant in front of a live audience to talk about London Station, his new thriller in which the CIA and British intelligence start spying on each other again — a scenario with real historical precedent. David explains why the tradecraft in his debut is already outdated, what he saw when AI flagged would-be spies from their phone data, and why he ob...

Barbara O’Neal — RWA Hall of Famer, multiple RITA winner, and author of more than 40 novels — joins Samantha Tennant to talk about A Thousand Painted Hours, a soulmate story that moves between colonial India and London during the Blitz. Barbara shares how the book followed her for years before her publisher said yes, how her British husband’s family history raised the question at its heart, and ho...

USA Today bestselling author CJ Carmichael has published more than 50 novels in romance, mystery, and women’s fiction, and she’s bringing her Coffee Creek, Montana series back to readers. She talks with Samantha Tennant about building fictional small towns with maps and Pinterest boards, why she’d rather solve a mystery through character than DNA, and why readers love to hate Olive, the controllin...

What happens when a flamboyant, fabulous 40-year-old man accidentally becomes the ruler of an island nation — and immediately starts wondering if the dragon made a terrible mistake? That's the heart of An Accident of Dragons, the debut fantasy from Cheri Radke, and it's not quite like anything else on shelves right now.

Mary Burton — NYT and USA Today bestselling thriller author, Amazon First Reads favorite, and self-described "Scary Mary" — joins Samantha Tennant to talk craft, characters, and her brand-new psychological thriller Trust No One. Mary breaks down her seven-draft writing process, explains why she plants twist endings before she even knows what they are, and makes a compelling case for heroines who a...

National award-winning historical romance author Robyn DeHart sits down with Samantha Tennant to talk about 90+ published titles, writing curvy heroines when publishers said no, and the grief-fueled pivot that launched her contemporary pen name Kat Baxter. Plus: the wrong-bride Regency story everyone is talking about, a Mount Rushmore of romance authors, and why her road-trip snack of choice is pi...

Australian bestselling author Kandy Shepherd joins Samantha Tennant for a wide-ranging conversation on writing, life, and what it means to stay in love with your characters for twenty-five books. Kandy — a former editor in chief who once ran a magazine with three million readers — talks about the career pivot that brought her to Harlequin Mills & Boon, the craft lessons journalism never let he...

Marc Cameron is a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author with three major thriller series and thirty years in law enforcement behind him. In this conversation with Samantha Tennant, Marc talks about the rejection letter from Random House that forced him to go "over the top" — and accidentally created Jericho Quinn. He shares what it was really like to write seven Tom Clancy Jack Ryan nove...

NYT and USA Today bestselling author Michelle M. Pillow joins Samantha Tennant to talk about the re-release of The King of the Unblessed (Book 1 of the Realm Immortal series) through Tor Bramble — a lush, epic dark romantasy that Michelle wrote long before "romantasy" was even a coined term. They dig into the Labyrinth-inspired origins of the Goblin King story, Michelle's massive world-building ac...

Bestselling historical romance author Cathy Maxwell joins Fresh Fiction to talk about her first indie release, Curves for the Rakish Duke, and her first-ever author collaboration with the Busty Bodice Club series. Cathy opens up about the surprising generosity of indie readers, the creative freedom of publishing without gatekeepers, and why she is finally revisiting an old favorite novella with fr...

Before Christine Gunderson became an Amazon bestselling author, she was a TV reporter, a Capitol Hill press secretary, and a stay-at-home mom who wrote her first novel in stolen minutes at school pickup. In this Fresh Fiction Video Book Club conversation with host Samantha Tennant, Christine talks about the long, twisty road to publication, the real women who inspired the 1965 storyline in her new...

This episode centers on the Fresh Fiction team's weekend at Kiss and Tell, a local romance author book signing event in Grapevine, Texas. The team attended alongside book club members, meeting favorite authors, discovering new-to-them authors, and connecting with fellow readers.

Bestselling author Jayne Castle joins Fresh Fiction's Podcast to talk about ENTER THE NIGHTMARE, book nineteen in her Harmony series. She traces the real government psychic research that inspired her world building, introduces Sebastian, the reader-made dust bunny that inspired her mascot, and shares stories from a Cotswolds hiking trip with fellow authors Susan Elizabeth Phillips and Christina Do...

Romance author Amy Award joins Samantha Tennant to talk about THE COCKY KINGMANS, her football-playing family of brothers, and why every heroine, no matter her size, deserves a happy ending.

Four award-winning authors — Nina Crespo, Misty Urban, Carrie Schaffer, and Debra Parmley — join host Samantha Tennant to pick their best summer reads, talk travel tropes, and reveal what makes their characters impossible to put down.

USA Today bestselling author Sheila Roberts joins Fresh Fiction's Samantha Tennant to talk about her latest novel, Love on the Shelf — a bookshop-set enemies-to-lovers story that's anything but your typical rom-com. Sheila opens up about the real cultural moment that inspired Parker Black (yes, the man everyone loves to hate), why she believes love always wins, and how the romance genre is finally...

Samantha Tennant sits down with Andrea Hairston — novelist, playwright, Afrofuturist, and self-described "scientist, artiste, and hoodoo conjurer" — to talk about her latest novel, THE REDEMPTION CENTER IS CLOSED ON SUNDAYS, a genre-defying extra-dimensional murder mystery anchored by a Saint Bernardoodle dog detective named Una. Andrea draws on her decades in theater — as director, playwright, an...

Samantha Tennant sits down with New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Mary Ellen Taylor to talk about her newest women's fiction novel, The Sky Beneath Her. Set on North Carolina's Outer Banks — nicknamed the Graveyard of the Atlantic — the book weaves between 1942, when a ship full of desperate passengers crosses U-boat-patrolled waters knowing they may not survive, and the present day,...

Bestselling Regency and Victorian romance author Kathleen Ayers joins Samantha Tennant to talk about leaving a 30-year career in media sales to follow a dare from her best friend — and ending up with a romance career she never saw coming. Kathleen shares how classic gateway novels like SWEET SAVAGE LOVE and THIS LOVING TORMENT shaped her love of historical fiction, why morally gray men are still t...

Ivy Cassidy — national bestselling author of more than 40 novels — joins Samantha Tennant to talk about her most ambitious book yet: House of Spells and Secrets, a sweeping historical fantasy rooted in the real legend of Biddy Early, the last woman tried for witchcraft in Ireland. Ivy shares how she balanced research with storytelling, why she set the book in 1971, and what it finally felt like to...

The line that launched the entire Orphan X series — and Gregg Hurwitz joined us on the Fresh Fiction Video Book Club to talk about what it means, 12 books in. From mind control cult research to his debut novella The Delivery, this is a conversation you don't want to miss. Link in bio.

Janna MacGregor joins Samantha Tennant to discuss her story in the Busty Bodice Club anthology, The Curves for the Secret Duke — a Regency romance with fake marriage, friends to lovers, and a secret-duke twist she rewrote from the ground up. They also talk about the anthology's collaborative process, writing full-figured heroines in the Regency era, and how Janna's legal training shaped her approa...

200: 14 Readers, 40+ Books, and One Missing CIA Novelist Episode 200 of the Fresh Fiction Podcast is here.  200 episodes. Evolving from chat, to film and television, to books and authors. Hundreds of author conversations. Thousands of book recommendations. And one community that shows up, week after week, for the love of reading.  Thank you for being part of this. Here’s to the next 200.  → freshf...

Julianne MacLean has been writing heartbreak and hope for 25 years — and she's just getting started. Host Samantha Tennant sits down with the USA Today bestselling author of What Tomorrow Will Be to talk about first loves, falling down and getting back up, and a brand-new chapter she wasn't supposed to announce yet. Plus Jane Eyre, Skittles, and a rescue dog named Rosie.