Photograph courtesy Jessica Strawser
Cincinnati author Jessica Strawser’s seventh and latest novel, Catch You Later (Lake Union Publishing), is centered on female friendship, like many of her books. Lark and Mikki work the night shift in a sleepy Ohio travel stop where their day-to-day is backdropped by the whirr of the interstate, transient customers, and the kind of sludgey coffee only found in a gas station.
The story works on multiple levels: It’s a road trip novel, a mystery, and a best friend story. The interstate itself acts as a metaphor as Lark and Mikki literally watch life pass them by. “The only place they have gainful employment in their town is at the highway travel stop, and literally everyone they encounter throughout the day is on their way somewhere else,” says Strawser. “They’re the only two who stay put. I think it affects their mindset and affects everything about the novel, not just the plot.”
The travel stop’s sleepiness is interrupted when a mysterious-yet-friendly stranger named Chris walks in. The ever-restless Mikki impulsively agrees to leave her shift, hit the road, and be his plus-one to a wedding in Florida. For one, she’s never seen the ocean. What does she have to lose? Except Mikki never returns, the hitch that sets the novel in motion.
The reader finds that Lark is still haunted by her friend’s disappearance eight years later when a seemingly clueless Chris returns. Still working at the travel stop, she begins to re-examine Mikki’s case. Catch You Later weaves between dual timelines and perspectives, giving readers glimpses of Mikki’s past and Lark’s present.
“It’s a novel about two best friends, but on the page they’re almost never together,” says Strawser. “We’re meeting them not only geographically apart—one’s in Ohio and the other got in a stranger’s car and we don’t know where she went—but also eight years apart. The real challenge was establishing their relationship with that gap between them.”
Released in late October, Catch You Later was an instant USA Today bestseller, marking Strawser’s second consecutive novel to make the list. The Last Caretaker became her first to debut as a USA Today bestseller in 2023. “That’s been completely amazing to see,” says Strawser. “When a book is that well received out of the gate, it means that people have preordered it before it was even available. The reception has been great.”
At the time of this interview, Strawser had recently tabled and sold out at the Kentucky Book Festival at the Joseph-Beth Booksellers location in Lexington. She was also looking forward to attending Books By the Bank in Cincinnati. Both events give her the opportunity to interact with readers in a space that’s shared by fellow writers.
Set at a fictionalized version of the Cincinnati Nature Center, The Last Caretaker navigated themes of domestic violence from the perspective of a bystander. Before The Last Caretaker, there was The Next Thing You Know, which followed an end-of-life doula. Both novels burrow into heavier topic material.
“What I wanted to do with Catch You Later was write something lighter that still had the depth and meaning to it and all the things that readers expect from one of my novels at this point,” says Strawser, “but that also had a little bit more levity and sense of adventure.”
She attributes Catch You Later’s out-of-the-gate success to riding the heels of The Last Caretaker. Along with being a USA Today bestseller, it marked the first book of hers to be featured on Amazon First Reads, a large promotion not only in the U.S. but in the UK, Australia, and Canada as well.
Surprisingly, the Amazon First Reads nod helped her reach local readers, too. Strawser recalls visiting a neighborhood book club in Loveland, where she lives, and the members hadn’t heard of her prior to seeing the promotion. That kind of reach was the big difference in The Last Caretaker compared to her previous novels.
Since her last novel, Strawser became a recipient of the 2024 Ohio Arts Council Individual Excellence Awards, along with 74 others. The program awards artists across disciplines and gives them resources to explore and develop their work. “I have set all seven of my novels at least partially in the Midwest,” she says. “I don’t necessarily know if I set out to do that up front, but it’s definitely something I’m very conscious and intentional about doing now. I really like writing about a place that feels like home.”
As a frequent book club choice, Strawser reflects that she’s had conversations with readers in Cincinnati and the Midwest that see themselves not only in the setting of her novels but in the people and themes, too. “It’s enriched the experience of writing and publishing them to have had those interactions with readers,” she says. “That’s something I’m grateful for and don’t take for granted.”
Jessica Strawser will discuss and sign her new novel December 7 at The Bookshelf in Maderia. Find additional book signings at jessicastrawser.com/events.
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