Kendall Aims' life is falling apart. She didn't win a much- anticipated writing award, and now her agent and her editor are avoiding her. Her husband is leaving her for the young realtor who is putting their house on the market after the divorce is final. Kendall runs to the mountains to hide from the world, but she still owes her publisher a book she hasn't even started. Her three closest friends and fellow writers, Tanya, Faye and Mallory, want to help.

Tanya works the early shift as a waitress and the late shift at a Laundromat to support her two pre-teen daughters and her alcoholic mother. She still finds time to write her books, but she's always tired and increasingly irritable.

Faye is married to a famous televangelist pastor and lives a very public life. Although she loves being an inspirational fiction writer, Faye has one secret that even her husband doesn't know.

Mallory has books on the best-sellers lists. Although many writers envy Mallory's success and dedication, they don't know what she has sacrificed to achieve her goals.

Kendall is supposed to be writing a novel about four women writers, but the deadline is tight and she's overwhelmed emotionally. How can she devote energy to creating a novel her editor has already promised will get no attention or support from the publisher? Based on the old advice of writing what you know, the four friends decide to each write fictionalized versions of their own real-life stories. This rather crazy idea appeals to each of them, and they can help Kendall fulfill her contract by contributing characters and chapters to her project. What the women don't know is that sometimes the truth makes remarkable fiction!

Wendy Wax weaves together the stories of four aspiring writers trying to make it as romance novelists in the brutal publishing business. She provides insightful glimpses into the minds of writers who are working to create compelling stories and characters. Because of the focus on novelists as characters, this novel is highly recommended for any aspiring author. If you enjoy smart and funny women's fiction, put THE ACCIDENTAL BESTSELLER at the top of your list.

Book Summary

Once upon a time four aspiring authors met at their very first writers’ conference. Ten years later they’re still friends, survivors of the ultra-competitive New York publishing world. Mallory St. James is a workaholic whose bestsellers support a lavish lifestyle. Tanya Mason is a single mother juggling two jobs, two kids, and too many deadlines. Faye Truett is the wife of a famous televangelist and the author of inspirational romances: no one would ever guess her explosive secret. Kendall Aims’s once-promising career is on the skids—and so is her marriage. Her sales are dismal, her new editor detests her work—and her husband is cheating. Barely able to think, let alone meet her final deadline, Kendall holes up in a mountain cabin to confront a blank page and a blanker future. But her friends won’t let her face this trial alone. Together they collaborate on a novel using their own lives as fodder, assuming no one will ever discover the truth behind their words.

No one is more surprised than they are when the book becomes a runaway bestseller. But with success comes scrutiny and scandal…as these four best friends suddenly realize how little they’ve truly known each other.