Community has been an integral part of my writing and publishing journey. I would not be doing, well, this if it wasn’t for the women I’ve connected with through the Women’s Fiction Writers Association. Most of whom I’ve only ever met via Zoom Write-Ins.
And four of us did a really, really, cool thing.
Over two years ago, we stayed late after a Friday afternoon Zoom to brainstorm. We were all stuck on projects, so we committed to meeting once a month to bounce ideas around. A few months in, we started talking about the rise of AI (obviously still an ongoing issue in the creative community), and we even fooled around with some fun prompts.
Friends, when like-minded, creative, and passionate people gather, magical things can come out of almost anything.
That one meeting turned into a story idea about four writers who create a book using AI that goes viral and tears them apart.
And that idea evolved into a book we published TUESDAY under the pen name Ivy H. Booker.
THE ACCIDENTAL LIFE OF MF ASCHER is unlike anything we’ve published. We’re branding it dark friendship fiction because of the twist on the typical friendship story. There’s humor, issues about AI in creative spaces, and a little murder thrown in.
Here’s the back cover:
Four writers. Four genres. Four reasons to kill.
When four broke writers meet for their annual retreat in upstate New York, they share it all—insulting rejection letters, crushing disappointments, the projects that almost made it but fell short. With s’mores, too much wine, and the need to let loose, they decide to have some harmless fun and create an outlandish story using AI.
But what starts out as a joke accidentally produces a real book that somehow goes viral and brings an unexpected cash windfall the likes of which they’d never thought possible.
As book sales surge and pressure to maintain their anonymity mounts, they turn against each other, leading to deadly consequences.
In The Accidental Life of MF Ascher, loyalties are tested, reputations are at stake, and revenge is the only way out.
Dark, gripping, and laugh-out-loud funny, this is a novel about friendship and the intoxicating dangers of money, technology, and the blinding quest to succeed at any cost.
THE ACCIDENTAL LIFE OF MF ASCHER is available in paperback and eBook now.
Meet the other writers behind Ivy H. Booker:
| Sara LaFontain lives in Arizona, where her husband lovingly supplies her with chocolate to fuel her writing habit. She is the author of the romantic women’s fiction Whispering Pines Island series, and the Corbitt Calamities pop star thrillers. Prior to becoming an author, she held a variety of jobs ranging from the unusual (wildlife tour guide in the Brazilian Pantanal) to the emotional (domestic violence case advocate) to the respectable (attorney). She also works as an Author Accelerator certified book coach. | Julie Mayerson Brown is an author, essayist, and playwright. Her Clearwater Series, five novels and a YA novella, takes place in a charming town in California Wine Country. The books all feature lovable, quirky characters, adorable dogs, best-friendships, and delicious sticky buns. In addition to feel-good stories, she writes book club fiction that delves into darker themes of family dysfunction, betrayal, and suspense. She lives in Los Angeles with her family and a pack of rescued boxers. | Marina DelVecchio is the author of Dear Jane (2019), The Professor’s Wife (2021), The Virgin Chronicles (2022), and Unsexed: Memoirs of a Prostitute’s Daughter (2024). Her essays appear in Ms. Magazine, HuffPo, The New Agenda, The Tishman Review, WE Magazine for Women, and Vast Literary Magazine, among others. She teaches writing, literature, and women’s studies as a full-time professor in North Carolina. |
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