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Amanda
Bestselling Novelist & Nonfiction Author
Reese’s Book Club Pick
Travels from: Austin, TX

“Arresting . . . Like a cool lake on a hot day, this story hits the spot.”—Publishers Weekly

Amanda Eyre Ward is the critically acclaimed author of six books, including The Same Sky, a beautiful and heartrending novel about motherhood, resilience, and faith. Amanda spent a year visiting shelters in Texas and California, meeting immigrant children and hearing their stories. The Same Sky is a ripped-from-the-headlines story of two families on both sides of the American border.

The Jetsetters is a delicious and intelligent novel about the courage it takes to reveal our true selves, the pleasures and perils of family, and how we navigate the seas of adulthood. The Jetsetters was selected by Reese Witherspoon for her “Hello Sunshine” book club in March 2020. Her most recent novel, The Lifeguards, explores the bonds between three picture-perfect—but viciously protective—mothers and their close-knit sons are tested during one unforgettable summer.

Amanda has also co-written a work of nonfiction, titled The Sober Lush (June 2020), with Jardine Libaire. The Sober Lush provides a road map for living a lush and sensual life without booze. Her latest novel, The Lifeguards, comes out April, 2022.

Amanda’s work has garnered many accolades, including the Violet Crown Book Award (Sleep Toward Heaven), a Target Bookmarked Pick (How to Be Lost and The Same Sky), and a Kirkus Best Book Pick (Close Your Eyes). After spending time in Maine, Cape Cod and New Orleans, Amanda and her family settled in Texas, where she currently lives.

Amanda's Featured Titles

Lovers and Liars: A Novel

Ballantine Books |
Women’s Fiction

Three wildly different sisters reunite for a destination wedding at an English castle in this heartfelt and rollicking novel from the New York Times bestselling author of The Jetsetters.

Once upon a time, the Peacock sisters were little girls who combed each other’s tangled hair. But decades of secrets have led them to separate lives—and to telling lies, to themselves and to one another.

Sylvie is getting married. Again. A librarian and widow who soothes her grief by escaping into books (and shelving them perfectly), Sylvie has caught the attention of an unlikely match: Simon Rampling, a mysterious, wealthy man from Northern England. Sylvie allows herself to imagine a life beside him—one filled with the written word, kindness, and companionship. She’s ready to love again . . . or is she?

Cleo is the golden child. A successful criminal defense lawyer with the perfect boyfriend, she is immediately suspicious of Simon. Is he really who he says he is? Cleo heads to Mumberton Castle with a case of investigative files, telling herself she will expose Simon and save her sister from more heartbreak . . . but who is she really trying to save?

Emma is living a lie. She can’t afford this fancy trip—and she definitely can’t tell her husband and sons why. She once dreamt of a line of her own perfumes. Fragrances allowed her to speak in silence. Now, that tendency for silence only worsens her situation. Will she emerge with her dignity and family intact?

When their toxic mother shows up, the sisters assume the roles they fell into to survive their childhood . . . but they just might find the courage to make new choices.

Set over a spectacularly dramatic weekend, in the grand halls of a sprawling castle estate—amidst floor-to-ceiling libraries, falconry lessons, and medieval meals—Lovers and Liars is the unforgettable story of a family’s ability to forgive and to find joy in one another once again.

The Lifeguards

Ballantine Books |
Novel

“A book that is at once riveting and relevant as it unpeels the various meanings of motherhood, family, and loyalty. I tore through it.”—Miranda Cowley Heller, author of The Paper Palace

The bonds between three picture-perfect—but viciously protective—mothers and their close-knit sons are tested during one unforgettable summer in a gripping novel from the New York Times bestselling author of The Jetsetters.

Austin’s Zilker Park neighborhood is a wonderland of greenbelt trails, live music, and moms who drink a few too many margaritas. Whitney, Annette, and Liza have grown thick as thieves as they have raised their children together for fifteen years, believing that they can shelter them their children from an increasingly dangerous world. Their friendship is unbreakable—as safe as the neighborhood where they’ve raised their sweet little boys.

Or so they think.

One night, the three women have been enjoying happy hour when their boys, lifeguards for the summer, come back on bicycles from a late-night dip in their favorite swimming hole. The boys share a secret—news that will shatter the perfect world their mothers have so painstakingly created.

Combining three mothers’ points of view in a powerful narrative tale with commentary from entertaining neighborhood listservs, secret text messages, and police reports, The Lifeguards is both a story about the secrets we tell to protect the ones we love and a riveting novel of suspense filled with half-truths and betrayals, fierce love and complicated friendships, and the loss of innocence on one hot summer night

The Sober Lush: A Hedonist’s Guide to Living a Decadent, Adventurous, Soulful Life–Alcohol Free

Tarcher Perigee |
Nonfiction

A sober hedonist’s guide to living a decadent, wild, and soulful life–alcohol-free.

In a culture where sipping “rosé all day” is seen as the epitome of relaxation, “grabbing a drink” the only way to network; and meeting at a bar the quintessential “first date,” many of us are left wondering if drinking alcohol really is the only way to cultivate joy and connection in life.

Jardine Libaire and Amanda Eyre Ward wanted to live spontaneous and luxurious lives, to escape the ordinary and enjoy the intoxicating. Their drinking, however, had started to numb them to the present moment instead of unlocking it. Ward was introduced to Libaire when she first got sober. As they became friends, the two women talked about how they yearned to create lives that were Technicolor, beautifully raw, connected, blissed out, and outside the lines . . . but how? In The Sober Lush, Libaire and Ward provide a road map for living a lush and sensual life without booze. This book offers ideas and instruction for such nonalcoholic joys as:

  The allure of “the Vanish,” in which one disappears early from the party without saying goodbye to a soul, to amble home under the stars
  The art of creating zero-proof cocktails for all seasons
  Having a fantastic first date while completely sober
  A primer on setting up your own backyard beehive, and honey tastings

For anyone curious about lowering their alcohol consumption or quitting drinking altogether, or anyone established in sobriety who wants inspiration, this shimmering and sumptuous book will show you how to keep indulging in life even if you stop indulging in alcohol.

The Jetsetters

Ballantine Books |
Novel

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • REESE’S BOOK CLUB PICK • Named One of the Best Beach Reads of the Year by Parade, O: The Oprah Magazine, and Good Housekeeping

“The exuberant activity aboard the Splendido Marveloso is no match for the fireworks set off as the lies explode. Full of wicked humor and delicious destination details.”—People (Book of the Week)

NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY ESQUIRE

When seventy-year-old Charlotte Perkins submits a sexy essay to the Become a Jetsetter contest, she dreams of reuniting her estranged children: Lee, an almost-famous actress; Cord, a handsome Manhattan venture capitalist who can’t seem to find a partner; and Regan, a harried mother who took it all wrong when Charlotte bought her a Weight Watchers gift certificate for her birthday. Charlotte yearns for the years when her children were young, when she was a single mother who meant everything to them.

When she wins the contest, the family packs their baggage—both literal and figurative—and spends ten days traveling from sun-drenched Athens through glorious Rome to tapas-laden Barcelona on an over-the-top cruise ship, the Splendido Marveloso. As lovers new and old join the adventure, long-buried secrets are revealed and old wounds are reopened, forcing the Perkins family to confront the forces that drove them apart and the defining choices of their lives.

Can four lost adults find the peace they’ve been seeking by reconciling their childhood aches and coming back together? In the vein of The Nest and The Vacationers, The Jetsetters is a delicious and intelligent novel about the courage it takes to reveal our true selves, the pleasures and perils of family, and how we navigate the seas of adulthood.

The Nearness of You

Ballantine Books |
Novel

In this profound and lyrical novel, acclaimed author Amanda Eyre Ward explores the deeper meanings of motherhood—from the first blissful hello to the heart-wrenching prospect of saying goodbye.

Brilliant heart surgeon Suzette Kendall is stunned when Hyland, her husband of fifteen years, admits his yearning for a child. From the beginning they’d decided that having children was not an option, as Suzette feared passing along the genes that landed her mother in a mental institution. But Hyland proposes a different idea: a baby via surrogate.

Suzette agrees, and what follows is a whirlwind of candidate selection, hospital visits, and Suzette’s doubts over whether she’s made the right decision. A young woman named Dorothy Muscarello is chosen as the one who will help make this family complete. For Dorrie, surrogacy (and the money that comes with it) are her opportunity to leave behind a troubled past and create a future for herself—one full of possibility. But this situation also forces all three of them—Dorrie, Suzette, and Hyland—to face a devastating uncertainty that will reverberate in the years to come.

Beautifully shifting between perspectives, The Nearness of You deftly explores the connections we form, the families we create, and the love we hold most dear.

The Same Sky

Ballantine Books |
Novel

From the acclaimed author of “How to Be Lost “and” Close Your Eyes” comes a beautiful and heartrending novel about motherhood, resilience, and faith a ripped-from-the-headlines story of two families on both sides of the American border.

Alice and her husband, Jake, own a barbecue restaurant in Austin, Texas. Hardworking and popular in their community, they have a loving marriage and thriving business, but Alice still feels that something is missing, lying just beyond reach.

Carla is a strong-willed young girl who’s had to grow up fast, acting as caretaker to her six-year-old brother Junior. Years ago, her mother left the family behind in Honduras to make the arduous, illegal journey to Texas. But when Carla’s grandmother dies and violence in the city escalates, Carla takes fate into her own hands and with Junior, she joins the thousands of children making their way across Mexico to America, facing great peril for the chance at a better life.

In this elegant novel, the lives of Alice and Carla will intersect in a profound and surprising way. Poignant and arresting, “The Same Sky” is about finding courage through struggle, hope amid heartache, and summoning the strength no matter what dangers await to find the place where you belong.

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Ripped from the Headlines: The Social Responsibility of the Contemporary Novelist

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The Nearness of You: Who is a Mother? Adoption and Surrogacy

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The Art of the Novel

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Writing and Motherhood

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Writing for Television and Film

Amanda’s Upcoming Events

Amanda’s Travel Writing

Amanda’s Essays and Shorts

Honors, Awards & Recognition

New York Times Bestseller
Reese’s Book Club
Target Book Club
Kirkus Reviews The Best Books Pick

Media Kit

By clicking the link below you will be directed to a Google Docs Folder
where you can download author photos and cover images.

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