IDOL

From the Irish bestselling author, IDOL follows American millionaire influencer, Samantha Johnson, forced to return to the small town she grew up in, when her childhood best friend accuses her of historic abuse. It addresses big themes like abuse, obsessive friendship, social media vs reality and weaves them together in an utterly compelling novel, perfect for commercial reading group readers.

Samantha Johnson is a forty-year-old American influencer who runs a wellness empire - Shakti. With an Oscar-winning adaptation of her NYT-bestselling memoir under her belt, a powerful brand as a no-nonsense motivational speaker, and a booming business which she is about to sell in a multi-million dollar deal she has the world at her feet. She's also launching a new book, CHASTE, in which she talks about her relationship with her sexuality.

After writing a viral essay about her teenaged sexual awakening with her (female) best friend, she comes off stage after a sell-out event to some shocking news from her manager. That female best friend, Lisa, is demanding the magazine withdraw the essay - she never consented to this experience being shared, and what Samantha sees as a powerful erotic moment she sees very differently. She sees it as abuse.

For now, Lisa isn't going public with her own version of events. But with Samantha's investors getting cold feet, and the eyes of her millions of fans on her, Samantha decides to return to the small town she grew up in, to confront Lisa, and convince her to drop the allegations. And who knows? Maybe they could even co-write the next book together, about the power of female friendship. Once she's back home, however, Samantha finds herself immediately wrongfooted by Lisa, now married to her high-school sweetheart, and the perfect suburban mom. Forced to confront the past she has whitewashed for years, she finds herself questioning her own memories. For both women have very different versions of how their relationship ended - so whose 'truth' is really a lie?

Louise O'Neill lives in Ireland where she is a weekly columnist for the Irish Examiner, but previously worked in the fashion industry in New York. She has written five previous novels, largely in the YA genre, including Only Ever Yours and Asking For It, which was a number-one bestseller in Ireland. She hosted a television documentary exploring the issue of consent and tackling sexual assault and rape culture in Ireland. Louise has written extensively around her own experiences with an eating disorder, which led to her hospitalisation.