Megan Miranda is the New York Times bestselling author of All the Missing Girls, The Perfect Stranger, The Last House Guest , which was a Reese Witherspoon Book Club pick, The Girl from Widow Hills, Such a Quiet Place, The Last to Vanish, and The Only Survivors. Her latest book is Daughter of Mine. She has also written several books for young adults. She grew up in New Jersey, graduated from MIT, and lives in North Carolina with her husband and two children.

In Daughter of Mine, readers follow Hazel Sharp, daughter of Mirror Lake’s longtime local detective. When Hazel unexpectedly inherits her childhood home, she’s warily drawn back to the town—and people—she left behind almost a decade earlier. But Hazel’s not the only relic of the past to return: a drought has descended on the region, and as the water level in the lake drops, long-hidden secrets begin to emerge…including evidence that may help finally explain the mystery of her mother’s disappearance.

This is your fifteenth novel; congratulations! Looking back at your prolific career up until this point, how have you evolved as a writer?

Thank you! I learned a lot about discovering my process and the types of stories I was drawn to in my first few years as a writer. In addition to moving from writing young adult to adult protagonists, I think I’ve become more of a risk-taker in the process—and realizing that the moments of uncertainty, or the drafts that don’t quite work yet, are steps in the process that will ultimately get me to the final version. I’ve also become a little more intentional about homing in on what I’m trying to explore from the start—for example, in the case of Daughter of Mine: the connections between family, in all its forms—which helps me bring a tight focus to the different layers of the story. I feel so fortunate to continue to create and explore these types of stories.

In your upcoming novel Daughter of Mine and past novels such as The Only Survivor and All the Missing Girls , the protagonists must return home to deal with traumatic events that took place during their formative years. What about this set-up is compelling to you?

One theme I’m drawn to exploring is how the past impacts the present, and how a place can be tied so tightly to time and memory—bringing the past right back to the surface. I choose to draw my characters back to the past in order to explore it from the outside-in, with the distance of time. At that point, they often feel like both insider and outsider, able to understand the inner workings of a place, but also able to see it from a remove, with a different perspective and understanding—perhaps finding themselves in the unique position to piece together the mystery. No matter what they’re running from, in order to move forward, ultimately every character has to come face to face with their past, and themselves.

Another hallmark of your novels is your spooky settings: from a vacation town in Maine (The Last House Guest), a mountain resort town in North Carolina (The Last to Vanish), an idyllic suburban neighborhood (Such a Quiet Place), and now a town on the verge of drought (Daughter of Mine). How do you develop the setting with the plot? Does one come before the other or are they imagined in tandem?

For me, setting is tied very tightly to the story, and they often develop side-by-side. In The Last to Vanish, the town of Cutter’s Pass was the first “character” I came up with. I like to see every setting as a unique character, with its own past—something that also feels alive and changing. For Daughter of Mine, the drought provides not only the clues to a mystery, but a ticking-clock the characters can feel in the atmosphere. I’m very intrigued by the duality of setting—how any place can be the most beautiful, or the most terrifying, depending on your perspective. And maybe more importantly, what it means for a place to become home.

On that note, regarding your writing process, are you consistent with how you plan each novel?

I like to give myself the freedom to do whatever works best for each story. I am consistent in that I don’t do a lot of up-front plot planning, but once I have a premise, a setting, and a main character, I throw myself into the story and see what begins to develop. Once I have an idea for the structure, that really helps me see the shape of a story, so I try to find that early on, and use that as a guide. But I don’t work with a pre-done outline. I develop the plot arc as I go, and let the characters lead the way.

What do you enjoy most about writing thrillers?

I love so much about thrillers, both as a reader and a writer. But at the heart, what I enjoy the most is diving into the world and unraveling the mysteries not only in the plot, but inside the characters themselves.

To give readers a little taste of Daughter of Mine, describe it in three words!

Hidden mysteries resurfacing.

Daughter of Mine publishes on April 9, 2024.

SPONSORED BY