Megan Collins: On the Complexity of Heartbreak

Megan Collins is the author of Cross My Heart, Thicker Than Water, The Family Plot, Behind the Red Door, and The Winter Sister. She taught creative writing for many years at both the high school and college level and is the managing editor of 3Elements Literary Review. She lives in Connecticut, where she obsesses over dogs, miniatures, and cake. Follow her on Instagram.

Photo by Tania Palermo

In this interview, Megan discusses the surprising amount of fun she’s had promoting her new thriller, Cross My Heart, her hope for readers, and more.

Name: Megan Collins
Literary agent: Sharon Pelletier
Book title: Cross My Heart
Publisher: Atria
Release date: January 14, 2025
Genre/category: Thriller
Previous titles: Thicker Than Water; The Family Plot; Behind the Red Door; The Winter Sister
Elevator pitch: A heart transplant recipient becomes romantically obsessed with her donor’s husband—even as rumors swirl that he may have had something to do with his wife’s premature death.

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What prompted you to write this book?

I wanted to explore and critique the romantic narrative that people, particularly women, are force-fed in society. There’s so much emphasis on coupling up, on the idea that you’re not complete unless you have a partner, and that can become quite toxic to ingest on a daily basis. My protagonist, Rosie, is someone who’s definitely been affected by that narrative, to the point where she frequently convinces herself she’s found “The One” in men who are anything but.

How long did it take to go from idea to publication? And did the idea change during the process?

In some ways, I’ve been working on this book since 2008, but at that time, it was a full-fledged romance—more specifically: a story of a young widow who falls in love with the recipient of her late husband’s heart. I didn’t get very far into the writing of that book (to be honest, I probably didn’t even make it out of the first chapter), but it was an idea that stuck with me for a long time—and an idea that morphed considerably once I started writing thrillers. Suddenly it was much darker, much more twisted, and therefore much more fun to potentially write. At some point, maybe two books ago, as I continued to let it simmer on the back burner, I thought of a really cool…thing—that’s all I’m willing to say—that could happen in it, but I was unsure if I had what it took to execute it. Finally, in late December 2022, I needed to present a new idea to my publisher, so I committed to plotting it out, to seeing if I could, in fact, make it work. Turns out I could because a year later, I completed the first draft, and by April 2024, it was off to production!

Were there any surprises or learning moments in the publishing process for this title?

One thing that’s been really different about the publishing process for this book compared to my others is how much I’ve thought about marketing from the start. Before I even had a contract in place, I had a tagline: “She has his wife’s heart; the one she wants is his.” The tone of that sentence—dark, slightly campy, a little WTF—became a touchstone for me as I was drafting, a line I returned to again and again to ensure it matched the mood of the book. Often, though, when I was supposed to be writing, I was jotting down promo ideas instead. This wasn’t because I was determined to market the book more successfully than my previous books; it was because, to me, this thriller feels like my most fun (if not my most unhinged) one yet, and I just want to talk about it!

In the months leading up to publication, I’ve been trying to get the word out on social media—focusing on humorous ways to convey the book’s vibes and elevator pitch, as well as its references to Taylor Swift (I am an absurdly huge Swiftie, so I’m excited to connect with other Swifties about that element)—and I’ve been working my editor’s delightful description of the book as “twisted You’ve Got Mail” into as many posts as I can. Normally, the marketing aspect for authors can be pretty time-consuming and tedious, especially as it takes their energy away from writing the next thing, but I’m savoring the chance to live in the world of this book for as long as I can. And that’s something I hope to take with me in every subsequent book I write: How can I write the novel in such a way that promoting it will be fun instead of a chore?

Were there any surprises in the writing process for this book?

I was surprised by how much of a blast I had writing from a man’s point of view! All of my thrillers have had female POV characters up until now, and while this one is solely narrated by a woman named Rosie, there are several interstitials in which we see messages to Rosie from the husband of her heart donor, as well as that same man’s emails to a friend about his new relationship. It was interesting for me to explore a man’s perspective about the beginning of a romance, especially as I played with the question of how much Rosie can really trust him. I wanted the reader to feel both drawn to him and wary of him, and it was so much fun creating the kind of voice that would hopefully accomplish that.

What do you hope readers will get out of your book?

I’d love for readers to think about the word “crazy” as it’s applied to women—and how, when a man calls a woman crazy, we often accept that her behavior was unhinged without cause, instead of questioning what the man might have done to push her to that point. I also hope that anyone who’s ever been heartbroken feels seen by Rosie’s journey in this book. There are probably a lot of things that Rosie does that readers won’t relate to (fair!), but I created Rosie, in part, as a way to talk about my own history with heartbreak—all the agony, fear, doubt, mistakes, insecurities, and, ultimately, on the other side of it all, self-empowerment that I experienced every time I went through a breakup (and incorrectly believed my world had ended).

If you could share one piece of advice with other writers, what would it be?

Whenever I’m asked this question, I always steal the advice Megan Abbott gave on the Writer’s Bone podcast, because it’s brilliant. “Write badly,” she said. It’s so simple, but I swear it’s revolutionized the way I write. I even keep that little phrase on a sticky note on my desk as a daily reminder. There’s so much freedom in setting aside the desire to be good, and instead just focusing on getting words on the page, on getting the story down—knowing, of course, that you can always go back and make it better. The funny thing is I always find that when I give myself permission to “write badly,” what I write ends up being fairly OK! All I really need, it turns out, is the permission not to seek perfection.