Reese Witherspoon is expanding her skillset and jumping headfirst into the world of thrilling fiction writing.
The Morning Show star joined podcast host Danielle Robay on the Tuesday (October 28) episode of the Bookmarked by Reese's Book Club to speak about her new novel Gone Before Goodbye, which hit shelves October 14. Co-written with Harlan Coben, Gone Before Goodbye is a suspenseful thriller following a woman trapped in a deadly conspiracy.
Witherspoon shared what led to the project and her collaboration with Coben, explaining how she had experience "[walking] into other people's stories" as an actor with a script that was already written or based on a published book, but this was the first time she had an idea for a character. After considering passing the idea on to someone else to write, she realized she could "give it a shot" herself.
"I've worked in worlds where I've watched people do this, I've read so many books. I was a huge fan of Harlan Coben and I read all his thrillers, and I thought, well why don't I give it a shot and try to write it myself," she said.
However, Witherspoon admitted that she was "scared" to reach out to Coben about the project because it would be a new experience for both of them.
"He's never collaborated with anybody before, and I was asking him basically to let me into his secret thriller writing world and that's really private for a lot of authors and artists," she said. "So the fact that he even just entertained the idea and then I had to go and pitch my heart out to him. It was great, it was scary too, but he was so receptive and so open to it."
Coben also acknowledged that he was "wary" when Witherspoon first reached out, but by the end of their first meeting "riffing" on ideas for the story, "there was no question in my mind, I was already totally in."
Follow along with new episodes of Bookmarked by Reese's Book Club at iHeart.com.