Is the next ‘it’ fantasy author this woman from Kentucky? Meet bestseller Meg Shaffer
For Meg Shaffer, much of the magic in her bestselling books is born in Louisville coffee shops.
Characters come to life on her screen between sips of iced coffee with cream at Quills Coffee on Frankfort Avenue and the Heine Brothers on Chenoweth Lane. Sometimes the details of a new world form over a steaming mug at Fante’s Coffeehouse. Each day, she and her husband choose a Derby City coffee shop that becomes the backdrop where she writes novels. Her work is geared to adult readers, who treasured stories when they were children. Shaffer’s first novel “The Wishing Game” is loosely inspired by Gene Wilder’s “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory,” and her newly released “The Lost Story” started as an unsuspected cross between "The Chronicles of Narnia" and "Lord of the Flies" that morphed into a romantic fantasy.
While these stories will arguably feel cozy and familiar to bookworms, fellow Kentuckians will find a few delightful Bluegrass pearls hidden within the pages.
“The Wishing Game” lists a chicken-fried Kentuckian as part of a competition called “The Utterly Impossible Scavenger Hunt.” “The Lost Story,” released this month, has a scene set in Bernheim Forest, except Shaffer's version is home to real giants rather than the large wooden sculptures we see 25 miles south of Louisville.
Born in Owensboro, a graduate of Centre College in Danville, and a Louisville homeowner — Shaffer is a Kentuckian through and through.
She’s also a national bestselling author, and we’ll likely hear more from her. She has a book deal with publishing giant Penguin Random House for at least two more novels.
The afternoon before “The Lost Story” release on July 16, Shaffer still had 80 pre-sold copies to sign before a launch party at Carmichael's Bookstore on Frankfort Avenue. She and her husband, fellow bestselling author Andrew Shaffer, had plans to lug several copies from her allotment over to the shop because there was a fear they might run out during the event. Shaffer's wistful brand of magic has quickly captivated readers and put her name alongside some of the best titles in the country. The Louisville author is a Book-of-The-Month Book of the Year Finalist, a USA Today Best Seller, and a #1 Barnes and Noble Bestseller.
Even so, she spent about half an hour on the phone telling me an entirely different story from the highly anticipated "The Lost Story." Her own story.
Just like Shaffer’s novels appeal to magic-hungry readers who believe in stories so much many still quietly wish for their Harry Potter Hogwarts acceptance letter to come, this new vibrant chapter of her writing career was born out of something widely relatable, too. She had chewed on the idea for “The Wishing Game” for nearly five years, but the heaviness of the COVID-19 pandemic pulled the story out of her.
Specifically, her 21-year-old cat Honeytoast “held on” for her and her husband during the shutdown and into the reopening of society. She died right around the time they got their first vaccine, leaving the Shaffers heartbroken and still very much in the ongoing quake of the pandemic.
In those tough months, Shaffer needed the joy she found creating the whimsical Clock Island that’s home to a wish-granting Mastermind in "The Wishing Game" just as much as her ever-growing fanbase needed to read something light.
“This is about the power of books that get us through dark passages in our life,” Shaffer told me. “I think that’s why people latched on to it so much, coming out of lockdown and coming out of the pandemic.”
The whimsical, hopeful story was unlike anything Shaffer had ever published, but it certainly wasn’t her first foray into storytelling. She has 35 romantic and erotic titles, including the popular "The Original Sinners" series published under a different pen name, Tiffany Reisz. After cranking out roughly four romantic novels a year for more than a decade, she was eager for a change. “The Wishing Game” was such a success when it hit shelves in 2023 that now with the support of her publisher, she says she can send “Tiffany to a farm upstate” and Meg can step into a more family-friendly spotlight.
The older you get, the closer you feel to your childhood, she told me. In recent years, she started returning to the books she loved when she was younger. The idea for “The Lost Story” began in 2018 when she reread William Golding's 1954 novel “Lord of the Flies.” Reacquainting herself with the characters Ralph and Jack, who are stranded on an island after a plane crash, left her feeling sad. She wanted to know what happened to those boys 15 or 20 years after they survived.
“When you’re young, you want to grow up, and when you’re older, you want to be young again,” she explained. “I’m reading middle-grade books, and I’m missing that feeling. I’m an old married lady now, and I miss sitting by my window in a summer rainstorm, and reading ‘A Wrinkle in Time,’ and eating ice cream like I did so many summers in Owensboro.”
As fascinated as she was by "Lord of the Flies," she couldn’t legally publish a sequel to a novel that wasn't in the public domain. So she set the book back on her shelf, next to the box set of "The Chronicles of Narnia."
Then in an almost Hollywood-like way, she said, she had an Eureka moment. She realized that if she pulled inspiration from both classic tales, and rearranged the origins, she had the framework for what would become “The Lost Story.”
“Writers are vultures, and we will steal every good idea we find,” she told me, with a teasing sincerity.
She submitted the first 20 pages as an audition to a writers’ workshop hosted by Pulitzer Prize-winning author Richard Russo. She got in. Six years and many, drafts later the famed author blurbed the front of her book.
“This is the book you’ve been waiting for,” Russo says on the cover.
At the recent Carmichael's Bookstore launch event, her Kentuckiana fans agreed.
“It reignites your love for reading,” said Willie Graham, one of the lucky few in the room who had already read an advanced copy of “The Lost Story.” “It is a fairy tale for adults and every kind of reader. You’ll go through a roller coaster of emotions and then come out on top of the world after reading this book.”
Of the 130 books Graham has read this year, she says “The Lost Story” is easily in her top three.
Donna Reidel loved “The Wishing Game” so much, she had to go back and read parts of it again. The retired professor from Jefferson County Technical College reads four books a week, and genuinely, she says there aren’t many that touch her the way that Shaffer’s work has.
“I don’t know how to explain it, it just made me believe in fairy tales again,” Reidel told me.
Since Shaffer finished “The Lost Story,” she’s turned her attention to her third book under the Meg Shaffer name. It doesn’t have a formal title yet, but just as “The Wishing Game” and “The Lost Story” might feel familiar to readers, she suspects this one will, too. This time she’s dabbling in mysteries and drawing inspiration from the famed “Nancy Drew” mystery series. Eventually, she’d like to continue “The Lost Story” as well, she said. She didn’t leave a cliffhanger at the end, but there’s an opening for more if her readership clamors for a sequel or two.
While there are certainly fantasy elements in Shaffer’s stories, much of Shaffer's ability to dazzle her audience comes from the nostalgia and heart that lingers in her pages.
So before we got off the phone last week, I tried to tap into that magic one more time.
In “The Wishing Game,” the Mastermind says “The only wishes ever granted are the wishes of brave children who keep on wishing even when it seems no one’s listening because someone, somewhere always is.”
“So what are you wishing for at this point,” I asked Shaffer with just hours to go before "The Lost Story's" debut.
“That’s a good question,” she told me.
Then, she took a thoughtful pause and said, “I am wishing for the readers that need 'The Lost Story' to find it because I think if they find it, they will be glad they found it. … There is a reader there that will appreciate this book on a very, very deep level, and I just hope they find it.”
Magic appears in literature in so many ways.
It doesn’t have to be finding a golden ticket to the chocolate factory, stepping into the wardrobe to Narnia or even meeting a real giant in “The Lost Story” version of Bernheim Forest.
“There is no greater feeling than finding a book that was written for you,” she finished.
Features columnist Maggie Menderski writes about what makes Louisville, Southern Indiana and Kentucky unique, wonderful, and occasionally, a little weird. If you've got something in your family, your town or even your closet that fits that description — she wants to hear from you. Say hello at mmenderski@courier-journal.com.
This article originally appeared on Louisville Courier Journal: Meet Kentucky' Meg Shaffer, best selling author of 'The Wishing Game'
