May 2012
Photo © Marion Ettlinger.
The eldest daughter of a traveling salesman, Jillian moved 17 times by age 17, ultimately ending up in Atlanta, where I Couldn’t Love You More is set. She has a BA from Barnard College/Columbia University and an MA from NYU, where she studied with such luminary writers as Mona Simpson, Jonathan Dee, Robert Coover, and Alice Walker. She also attended Master Classes with Toni Morrison, Joyce Carol Oates, and Grace Paley. A former fellow at the MacDowell Colony, Blue Mountain Center, VCCA and Fundación Valparaiso in Almeria, Spain, Jillian taught at NYU and the University of Georgia. She currently lives in Brooklyn, New York with her family where she is hard at work on a new novel.
Jillian Medoff is the acclaimed author of I Couldn’t Love You More, Hunger Point and Good Girls Gone Bad. A huge seller in the United States, Hunger Point was the basis for an original Lifetime TV movie starring Barbara Hershey and Christina Hendricks. Her novels have been translated into several different languages, including Spanish, French, Japanese (abridged), Polish, Turkish, Hebrew and German (forthcoming).
"At once heartbreaking and funny, a debut novel on death and renewal that is strong and honest… Despite the subject matter, an exuberant meditation on life, family, and the hard-won satisfactions of personal change."
—Kirkus Reviews
"Acerbic wit and pathos distinguish Medoff's accomplished second novel …Another success, combining genuine psychological depth with humor and irony."
—Kirkus Reviews
"By turns hilarious and heart-wrenching, Medoff's honest writing and realistic dialogue make the book truly enjoyable, while a Sophie's Choice moment and its repercussions make it a real page-turner."
—Booklist
"Medoff's exploration of fidelity, family, and parenthood provides a complex look at the difficult role of a stepparent."
—Publishers Weekly
I Couldn't Love You More by
Which child would you save? A decision no parent can even fathom. Eliot Gordon would do anything for her family. A 38-year-old working mother, she lives an ordinary but fulfilling life in suburban Atlanta with her partner, Grant Delaney, and their three daughters. The two older girls are actually Eliot's stepdaughters, a distinction she is reluctant to make as she valiantly attempts to maintain a safe, happy household . . . Then Finn Montgomery, Eliot's long-lost first love, appears, triggering a shocking chain of events that culminates in a split-second decision that will haunt her beloved family forever. How Eliot survives-and what she loses in the process-is a story that will resonate with anyone who has ever loved a child. With hilarious honesty, wrenching depth, and a knockout twist, I COULDN'T LOVE YOU MORE illuminates the unbreakable bonds of family and reveals the lengths we'll go to save each other, even as we can't save ourselves.
Hunger Point by
When her younger sister is hospitalized for anorexia, twenty-six-year-old Frannie finds herself cut adrift, unable to hold a job or relate to her parents, until her sister's shocking suicide jolts her into action.
Good Girls Gone Bad by
In her eagerly awaited second novel, critically acclaimed author Jillian Medoff demonstrates once again her unique ability to tell an utterly original story. A hilarious tale of revenge and redemption, Good Girls Gone Bad celebrates the indomitable strength and ingenuity of the female spirit. Janey Fabre knows she isn't exactly the average thirty-something woman. After all, she has found herself stalking her ex-boyfriend on more than one occasion. But when she joins group therapy, she is convinced that the other women she meets are ten times loopier than she is. Suzanna aka "The Dream Weaver" prefers the company of her dog to human beings, Laura is a record-breaking gold medalist in the one-night-stand Olympics, and Bethany, a forty-year-old divorcee, still lives with her mother and shares her toe rings. Not to mention Valentine, a painfully shy beauty who binges on Dove Bars; Ivy, a sweet-talking southern belle who binges on Botox; and Natasha, who wears a face mask to protect herself against unseen airborne pathogens. Over time, however, Janey and the girls learn to trust one other, so much so that the outrageous scheme they concoct for asserting themselves actually begins to make sense. And suddenly they're embroiled in a reckless and exhilarating misadventure that wreaks havoc on their lives but ultimately illuminates for them the power of loyalty and the true meaning of friendship. As fiercely intelligent as it is laugh-out-loud funny, Good Girls Gone Bad showcases Jillian Medoff's dazzling and distinctive voice, and clearly establishes her as a writer of rare and remarkable gifts.