Authors Like Jane Fallon

Fay Weldon

British · Puffball (1980), The Life and Loves of a She-Devil (1983)

Weldon (1931–2023) was born in Birmingham, grew up in New Zealand and worked as an advertising copywriter before writing for television; she wrote the first episode of Upstairs, Downstairs (1971). In The Life and Loves of a She-Devil Ruth, a plain wife whose husband leaves her for a glamorous romantic novelist, sets out to take his new life apart piece by piece. The BBC adapted it in 1986.

Nora Ephron

American · Heartburn (1983), I Feel Bad About My Neck (2006)

Ephron (1941–2012) was a journalist, essayist and screenwriter, best known for When Harry Met Sally (1989). Heartburn, her only novel, is narrated by a food writer, seven months pregnant, who discovers her husband is having an affair; it drew openly on the end of her marriage to the journalist Carl Bernstein.

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Patricia Highsmith

American · Strangers on a Train (1950), The Talented Mr. Ripley (1955)

Highsmith was born in Fort Worth, Texas, in 1921, spent much of her later life in Europe and died in Switzerland in 1995. Strangers on a Train, filmed by Alfred Hitchcock, and five novels about the charming murderer Tom Ripley made her name. Her diaries and biographers record open antisemitism and racism.

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Marian Keyes

Irish · Watermelon (1995), Rachel’s Holiday (1997), My Favourite Mistake (2024)

Keyes was born in Limerick in 1963, moved to London for office work and began writing stories while she was still drinking; she stopped after treatment in Dublin. Watermelon opens with a woman whose husband leaves her on the day she gives birth to their daughter. Her novels about the Walsh sisters reached television as The Walsh Sisters in 2025.

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Sophie Kinsella

British · The Secret Dreamworld of a Shopaholic (2000), Can You Keep a Secret? (2003), What Does It Feel Like? (2024)

Sophie Kinsella was the pen name of Madeleine Wickham (1969–2025), who published her first novel, The Tennis Party, under her own name in 1995. The Shopaholic books, about a financial journalist hiding her debts, became a long series and a 2009 film. In 2024 she revealed that she had glioblastoma, a brain cancer, and published What Does It Feel Like?, a short novel drawn from that experience; she died in December 2025, aged 55.

Liane Moriarty

Australian · The Husband’s Secret (2013), Big Little Lies (2014), Here One Moment (2024)

Moriarty was born in Sydney in 1966 and worked in advertising before writing fiction. Big Little Lies follows three mothers at a beachside primary school in the months before a death at a school trivia night, and was adapted by HBO in 2017. Her novels mix school-gate comedy with domestic violence, adultery and grief.

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Lisa Jewell

British · Ralph’s Party (1999), Then She Was Gone (2017), The Family Upstairs (2019)

Jewell was born in London in 1968 and wrote Ralph’s Party, a comedy about a London flat-share, after a friend offered to buy her dinner if she produced three chapters; it was the UK’s bestselling debut novel of 1999. She later moved into psychological suspense: None of This Is True (2023) won the British Book Award for crime and thriller, and It Could Have Been Her followed in 2026.

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Mhairi McFarlane

Scottish · You Had Me at Hello (2012), Don’t You Forget About Me (2019), Mad About You (2022)

McFarlane was born in Falkirk in 1976 and worked as a journalist, mainly at the Nottingham Post, before her first book deal in 2011. She has published twelve romantic comedies, from You Had Me at Hello to Cover Story (2025).

Ruth Jones

Welsh · Never Greener (2018), By Your Side (2025)

Jones was born in Bridgend in 1966. She co-wrote Gavin & Stacey (2007–2010, with specials in 2019 and 2024) with James Corden and played Nessa, and created the Sky series Stella. Her first novel, Never Greener, grew out of a screenplay she wrote in 2004 and follows an old affair rekindled years later.

Gillian Flynn

American · Sharp Objects (2006), Dark Places (2009), Gone Girl (2012)

Flynn was born in Kansas City, Missouri, in 1971 and was a feature writer and television critic at Entertainment Weekly until 2008. Gone Girl is told in alternating sections by a husband whose wife vanishes on their fifth wedding anniversary and by the wife herself; it was filmed by David Fincher in 2014 from Flynn’s own screenplay. Some critics have called her women misogynist portraits; Flynn calls herself a feminist and defends writing women who are not nice.

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