Jennifer Weiner Popular Books

Jennifer Weiner Biography & Facts

Jennifer Weiner (born March 28, 1970) is an American writer, television producer, and journalist. She is based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Her debut novel, published in 2001, was Good in Bed. Her novel In Her Shoes (2002) was made into a movie starring Cameron Diaz, Toni Collette, and Shirley MacLaine. Background and education Weiner was born to a Jewish family in DeRidder, Louisiana, where her father was stationed as an army physician. The next year, her family (including a younger sister and two brothers) moved to Simsbury, Connecticut, where Weiner spent her childhood. When Weiner was 16, her father abandoned the family. He died of a crack cocaine overdose in 2008.Her first novel, Good in Bed, is loosely based on her young-adult life: like the main character, Cannie Shapiro, Weiner's parents divorced when she was 16, and her mother came out as a lesbian at age 55. Weiner has said that she was "one of only nine Jewish kids in her high school class of 400" at Simsbury High School. She entered Princeton University at the age of 17 and graduated summa cum laude with an A.B. in English in 1991 after completing an 86-page-long senior thesis titled "'Never Far From Mother --' On the Uses of Essentialism in Novels and Films."At Princeton, Weiner studied with J. D. McClatchy, Ann Lauterbach, John McPhee, Toni Morrison, and Joyce Carol Oates. Her first published story, "Tour of Duty," appeared in Seventeen in 1992. Career After graduating from college, Weiner joined the Centre Daily Times, the daily newspaper of State College, Pennsylvania, where she managed the education beat and wrote a regular column called "Generation XIII" (referring to the 13th generation following the American Revolution), aka "Generation X." From there, she moved on to Kentucky's Lexington Herald-Leader, still penning her "Generation XIII" column, before finding a job with The Philadelphia Inquirer as a features reporter. She continued to write for the Inquirer, freelancing on the side for Mademoiselle, Seventeen, and other publications, until after her first novel, Good in Bed, was published in 2001. In 2005, her second novel, In Her Shoes (2002), was made into a feature film starring Cameron Diaz, Toni Collette and Shirley MacLaine by 20th Century Fox. Her sixth novel, Best Friends Forever, was a No. 1 New York Times bestseller and made Publishers Weekly's list of the longest-running bestsellers of the year. To date, she is the author of nine bestselling books, including eight novels and a collection of short stories, with a reported 11 million copies in print in 36 countries. Her novel The Next Best Thing was published by Simon & Schuster in July 2012. Her writing on gender and culture appears frequently in The New York Times. In addition to writing fiction, Weiner is a co-creator and executive producer of the (now-cancelled) ABC Family sitcom State of Georgia, and she is known for "live-tweeting" episodes of the reality dating shows The Bachelor and The Bachelorette. In 2011, TIME named her to its list of the Top 140 Twitter Feeds "shaping the conversation." She is a self-described feminist. Criticism of gender bias in the media Weiner has been a vocal critic of what she sees as the male bias in the publishing industry and the media, alleging that books by male authors are better received than those written by women, that is, reviewed more often and more highly praised by critics. In 2010, she told The Huffington Post, "I think it's a very old and deep-seated double standard that holds that when a man writes about family and feelings, it's literature with a capital L, but when a woman considers the same topics, it's romance, or a beach book – in short, it's something unworthy of a serious critic's attention. ... I think it's irrefutable that when it comes to picking favorites – those lucky few writers who get the double reviews AND the fawning magazine profile AND the back-page essay space AND the op-ed ... the Times tends to pick white guys." In a 2011 interview with The Wall Street Journal blog Speakeasy, she said, "There are gatekeepers who say chick lit doesn’t deserve attention but then they review Stephen King." When Jonathan Franzen's novel Freedom was published in 2010 to critical acclaim and extensive media coverage (including a cover story in TIME), Weiner criticized what she saw as the ensuing "overcoverage," igniting a debate over whether the media's adulation of Franzen was an example of entrenched sexism within the literary establishment. Though Weiner received some backlash from other female writers for her criticisms, a 2011 study by the organization VIDA bore out many of her claims, and Franzen himself, in an interview with The Daily Telegraph, agreed with her: "To a considerable extent, I agree. When a male writer simply writes adequately about family, his book gets reviewed seriously, because: 'Wow, a man has actually taken some interest in the emotional texture of daily life', whereas with a woman it’s liable to be labelled chick-lit. There is a long-standing gender imbalance in what goes into the canon, however you want to define the canon."As for the label "chick lit", Weiner has expressed ambivalence towards it, embracing the genre it stands for while criticizing its use as a pejorative term for commercial women's fiction. "I’m not crazy about the label," she has said, "because I think it comes with a built-in assumption that you’ve written nothing more meaningful or substantial than a mouthful of cotton candy. As a result, critics react a certain way without ever reading the books." In 2008, Weiner published a critique on her blog of a review by Curtis Sittenfeld of a Melissa Bank novel. Weiner deconstructs Sittenfeld's review, writing, "The more I think about the review, the more I think about the increasingly angry divide between ladies who write literature and chicks who write chick lit, the more it seems like a grown-up version of the smart versus pretty games of years ago; like so much jockeying for position in the cafeteria and mocking the girls who are nerdier/sluttier/stupider than you to make yourself feel more secure about your own place in the pecking order."In November 2019, Weiner participated in the harassment and abuse of Brooke Nelson, a college student who was mentioned in her local newspaper as saying she thought that author Sarah Dessen's YA novels were not suitable for the Common Read program run by Northern State University, Aberdeen, and that she had advocated for the inclusion of civil rights attorney Bryan Stevenson's memoir, Just Mercy, instead. In a series of since-deleted tweets, Weiner described Nelson's opposition to Dessen's inclusion in the Common Reads program as "catty and cruel", part of "systemic discrimination" against young women, and linked it to coverage of gymnastics doctor Larry Nassar's repeated sexual assaults on young women. She later stated that she had "zero regrets" regarding these remarks. When the story was repo.... Discover the Jennifer Weiner popular books. Find the top 100 most popular Jennifer Weiner books.

Best Seller Jennifer Weiner Books of 2024

  • Sing You Home synopsis, comments

    Sing You Home

    Jodi Picoult

    From the awardwinning, #1 New York Times bestselling author whom USA TODAY calls a “master of the pageturner,” comes the spectacular story of a woman’s complex quest to form a fami...

  • Nineteen Minutes synopsis, comments

    Nineteen Minutes

    Jodi Picoult

    Jodi Picoult, bestselling author of My Sister's Keeper and Small Great Things pens her most riveting book yet, with a startling and poignant story about the devastating aftermath o...

  • Mrs. Everything synopsis, comments

    Mrs. Everything

    Jennifer Weiner

    From Jennifer Weiner, the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Who Do You Love and In Her Shoes comes a smart, thoughtful, and timely exploration of two sisters’ lives from the ...

  • These Girls synopsis, comments

    These Girls

    Sarah Pekkanen

    Internationally bestselling author Sarah Pekkanen examines the lives of three women working and living together in New York City and shows that family secrets may shape us all, but...

  • The Summer of Good Intentions synopsis, comments

    The Summer of Good Intentions

    Wendy Francis

    Cape Cod summers are supposed to remain reassuringly the same, but everything falls apart when three sisters and their families come together for their annual summer vacationand th...

  • That Summer synopsis, comments

    That Summer

    Jennifer Weiner

    INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER Named a Notable Work of Fiction by The Washington PostFrom the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Big Summer comes another “ideal beach read,...

  • All Your Perfects synopsis, comments

    All Your Perfects

    Colleen Hoover

    INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER The #1 New York Times bestselling author of It Starts with Us and It Ends with Uswhose writing is “emotionally wrenching and utterly original” (Sa...

  • Good in Bed synopsis, comments

    Good in Bed

    Jennifer Weiner

    #1 New York Times bestselling author Jennifer Weiner brings to life an irresistibly funny and relatable heroine in the novel The Boston Globe called “funny, fanciful, extremely poi...

  • Maybe Not synopsis, comments

    Maybe Not

    Colleen Hoover

    Colleen Hoover, the #1 New York Times bestselling author of It Starts with Us, It Ends with Us, and Maybe Someday brilliantly brings to life the story of the hilarious and charisma...

  • Certain Girls synopsis, comments

    Certain Girls

    Jennifer Weiner

    Readers fell in love with Cannie Shapiro, the smart, sharptongued, bighearted heroine of Good in Bed who found her happy ending after her mother came out of the closet, her father ...

  • Goodnight Nobody synopsis, comments

    Goodnight Nobody

    Jennifer Weiner

    New York Times bestselling author Jennifer Weiner’s unforgettable story of adjusting to suburbiaand all the surprises hidden behind its doors.For Kate Klein, a semiaccidental mothe...

  • Lone Wolf synopsis, comments

    Lone Wolf

    Jodi Picoult

    A life hanging in the balance…a family torn apartNew York Times bestselling author Jodi Picoult tells an unforgettable story about family secrets, love, and letting go. On an icy w...

  • All Fall Down synopsis, comments

    All Fall Down

    Jennifer Weiner

    From a #1 New York Times bestselling author comes her “best book yet” (Philadelphia Inquirer), a “compulsively readable” novel that shows “there’s no doubt Weiner knows how to deli...

  • Vanishing Acts synopsis, comments

    Vanishing Acts

    Jodi Picoult

    The #1 New York Times bestselling author of modern classics such as My Sister’s Keeper and Small Great Things weaves a “richly textured and engaging” (The Boston Globe) tale that e...

  • Skipping a Beat synopsis, comments

    Skipping a Beat

    Sarah Pekkanen

    From the author of the acclaimed The Opposite of Me, a poignant, witty novel about marriage, forgiveness, and the choices that give shapeand limitsto our lives.What would you do if...

  • The Opposite of Me synopsis, comments

    The Opposite of Me

    Sarah Pekkanen

    A "fresh, funny, and satisfying" (New York Times bestselling author Jennifer Weiner) about the complicated bonds of sisterhood.Twentynineyearold Lindsey Rose has, for as long as sh...

  • The Tenth Circle synopsis, comments

    The Tenth Circle

    Jodi Picoult

    From New York Times bestselling author Jodi Picoult, a powerful novel that explores the unbreakable bond between parent and child, and questions whether you can reinvent yourself i...

  • House Rules synopsis, comments

    House Rules

    Jodi Picoult

    From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Small Great Things and the modern classics My Sister’s Keeper, The Storyteller, and more, comes a “complex, compassionate, and smar...

  • Finding Cinderella synopsis, comments

    Finding Cinderella

    Colleen Hoover

    #1 New York Times bestselling author of It Starts with Us and It Ends With Us writes a free novella about the search for happily ever after.A chance encounter in the dark leads eig...

  • Maybe Someday synopsis, comments

    Maybe Someday

    Colleen Hoover

    From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of It Starts with Us and It Ends with Us comes a passionate tale of friendship, betrayal, and romance.At twentytwo years old, Sydney i...

  • Fly Away Home synopsis, comments

    Fly Away Home

    Jennifer Weiner

    Sometimes all you can do is fly away home . . . When Sylvie Serfer met Richard Woodruff in law school, she had wild curls, wide hips, and lots of opinions. Decades later, Sylvie ha...

  • The Soulmate Equation synopsis, comments

    The Soulmate Equation

    Christina Lauren

    INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER“Writing duo and reigning romance queens Christina Lauren are back with The Soulmate Equation, their most ambitious book to date.” PopSugar​“A sexy...

  • Plain Truth synopsis, comments

    Plain Truth

    Jodi Picoult

    From the bestselling author of My Sister's Keeper comes the riveting story of a murder that shatters the picturesque calm of Amish countryand tests the heart and soul of the lawyer...

  • Salem Falls synopsis, comments

    Salem Falls

    Jodi Picoult

    From #1 New York Times bestselling author Jodi Picoult comes a compelling and “multilayered tale of smalltown intrigue” (Glamour) about a prep schoolteacher accused of rape by a gr...

  • Finding Perfect synopsis, comments

    Finding Perfect

    Colleen Hoover

    From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of It Starts with Us and It Ends with Usthe heartwarming conclusion to the Hopeless series that illustrates the power of following a d...

  • Best Friends Forever synopsis, comments

    Best Friends Forever

    Jennifer Weiner

    From New York Times bestselling author Jennifer Weiner comes "a smart, witty fairy tale for grownups" (Maureen Corrigan, NPR).Addie Downs and Valerie Adler will be best friends for...

  • The Next Best Thing synopsis, comments

    The Next Best Thing

    Jennifer Weiner

    Blockbuster #1 New York Times bestselling author Jennifer Weiner returns with an irresistible story about a young woman trying to make it in Hollywood…Actors aren’t the only ones t...

  • This Girl synopsis, comments

    This Girl

    Colleen Hoover

    From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of It Starts with Us and It Ends with Us, Colleen Hoover’s bestselling Slammed series comes to its gripping conclusion. There are two ...

  • Slammed synopsis, comments

    Slammed

    Colleen Hoover

    From #1 New York Times bestselling author of It Starts with Us and It Ends with Us, Colleen Hoover’s romantic, emotionpacked debut novel unforgettably captures all the magic and co...

  • The Best of Us synopsis, comments

    The Best of Us

    Sarah Pekkanen

    Paradise isn’t quite what it seems as four college friends meet for an island vacation in this captivating new novel from the acclaimed author of These Girls.An allexpensepaid week...

  • Point of Retreat synopsis, comments

    Point of Retreat

    Colleen Hoover

    From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of It Starts with Us, It Ends with Us, and All Your Perfects. Sometimes two people have to fall apart to realize just how much they be...

  • The Summer of Lost and Found synopsis, comments

    The Summer of Lost and Found

    Mary Alice Monroe

    The New York Times bestselling Beach House series continues with this timely, tender, and compassionate tale of perseverance, love, and the bonds of family in the face of tremendou...

  • Confess synopsis, comments

    Confess

    Colleen Hoover

    From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of It Starts with Us and It Ends with Us, a novel about risking everything for loveand finding your heart somewhere between the truth...

  • Lucky synopsis, comments

    Lucky

    Marissa Stapley

    REESE’S BOOK CLUB PICKA thrilling rollercoaster ride about a heist gone terribly wrong, with a plucky protagonist who will win readers’ hearts.What if you had the winning ticket th...

  • Big Summer synopsis, comments

    Big Summer

    Jennifer Weiner

    A deliciously funny, remarkably poignant “beach read to end all beach reads” (Entertainment Weekly) about the power of friendship, the lure of frenemies, and the importance of maki...

  • On Ocean Boulevard synopsis, comments

    On Ocean Boulevard

    Mary Alice Monroe

    This “authentic, generous, and heartfelt” (Mary Kay Andrews, New York Times bestselling author) instant New York Times bestseller from the author of The Summer of Lost and Found re...

  • Perfect Match synopsis, comments

    Perfect Match

    Jodi Picoult

    Picoult brings to life a female prosecutor whose cherished family is shattered when she learns that her fiveyearold son has been sexually abused.What does it mean to be a good moth...

  • It Starts with Us synopsis, comments

    It Starts with Us

    Colleen Hoover

    Before It Ends with Us, it started with Atlas. Colleen Hoover tells fan favorite Atlas’s side of the story and shares what comes next in this longanticipated sequel to the “gloriou...

  • Handle with Care synopsis, comments

    Handle with Care

    Jodi Picoult

    When Willow is born with severe osteogenesis imperfecta, her parents are devastatedshe will suffer hundreds of broken bones as she grows, a lifetime of pain. In this provocative st...

  • Then Came You synopsis, comments

    Then Came You

    Jennifer Weiner

    An unexpected love story… Jules Strauss is a Princeton senior with a full scholarship, acquaintances instead of friends, and a family she’s ashamed to invite to Parents’ Weeke...

  • Change of Heart synopsis, comments

    Change of Heart

    Jodi Picoult

    The beloved #1 New York Times bestselling author and “master of the craft of storytelling” (Associated Press) weaves a spellbinding tale of a mother’s tragic loss and one man’s cha...

  • November 9 synopsis, comments

    November 9

    Colleen Hoover

    Beloved #1 New York Times bestselling author of It Starts with Us, It Ends with Us, and All Your Perfects returns with an unforgettable love story between a writer and his unexpect...

  • Something Wilder synopsis, comments

    Something Wilder

    Christina Lauren

    The “reigning romance queens” (PopSugar) and New York Times bestselling authors of The Soulmate Equation and The Unhoneymooners present a charming and laughoutloud funny novel fill...

  • What Was Mine synopsis, comments

    What Was Mine

    Helen Klein Ross

    “A suspenseful, moving look at twisted maternal love and the limits of forgiveness.” People“Not only a terrific, spellbinding read but a fascinating meditation on the choices we ma...

  • The Summer Place synopsis, comments

    The Summer Place

    Jennifer Weiner

    From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of That Summer comes another “fun, feisty” (The Washington Post) novel of family, secrets, and the ties that bind.When her twentytwoye...

  • Maybe Now synopsis, comments

    Maybe Now

    Colleen Hoover

    From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of It Starts with Us and It Ends with Usthe longawaited finale to the bestselling Maybe Someday series returns with all the characters...

  • Without Merit synopsis, comments

    Without Merit

    Colleen Hoover

    From Colleen Hoover, the #1 New York Times bestselling author of It Starts with Us and It Ends with Us, comes a moving and haunting novel of family, love, and the power of the trut...

  • Losing Hope synopsis, comments

    Losing Hope

    Colleen Hoover

    #1 New York Times bestselling author of It Starts with Us and It Ends with Us held readers spellbound with her novel Hopeless, the story of what happened when a troubled girl named...

  • Twice in a Blue Moon synopsis, comments

    Twice in a Blue Moon

    Christina Lauren

    From the New York Times bestselling author of The Unhoneymooners and the “delectable, moving” (Entertainment Weekly) My Favorite HalfNight Stand comes a modern love story about wha...

  • Who Do You Love synopsis, comments

    Who Do You Love

    Jennifer Weiner

    #1 New York Times bestselling author Jennifer Weiner delivers "a tale of love against the odds" (People).Rachel Blum and Andy Landis are just eight years old when they meet one nig...