Do Tell

'Do Tell is an absolute marvel: page-turning yet thought-provoking, historical in its setting yet contemporary in its concerns. . . A deeply moving, immensely satisfying, blockbuster of a debut novel'
Anthony Marra

***

The summer read of 2023: A whip-smart, glamorous and poignant debut set in Golden Age Hollywood

As character actress Edie O'Dare finishes the final year of her contract with FWM Studios, the clock is ticking for her to find a new gig after an undistinguished stint in the pictures. She's long been moonlighting for Hollywood's reigning gossip columnist, providing her with the salacious details of every party and premiere - so when an up-and-coming starlet hands her a letter alleging an assault from an A-list actor, Edie helps get the story into print.

Edie's second act career grants her more control on the page than she ever commanded in front of the camera, but she quickly learns that publishing the secrets of her friends and colleagues has repercussions. And when she finds herself in the middle of the trial of the decade, Edie is forced to make an impossible choice with the potential to ruin more than one life.

Debut novelist Lindsay Lynch brings the golden age of Hollywood to glittering life, from star-studded opening nights to backlot brawls, on-location Westerns to the Hollywood Canteen. Through Edie's wry observations, Lynch maps the intricate networks of power that manufacture the magic of the movies, and interrogates who actually gets to tell women's stories.

Praise for Do Tell:

'Like our intrepid narrator, TO BEGIN AND BEGIN AGAIN manages to be both funny and substantive, breezy and wise. I stepped into the stream of the narrative and didn't look up until I came to the last page'
Ann Patchett, author of The Dutch House

'There is little more alluring than the promise of secrets, and Do Tell is full of them--glamorous, tawdry, and human. Lindsay Lynch has created a rich portrait of the lives of early Hollywood's beautiful puppets and those holding their strings'
Emma Straub, author of This Time Tomorrow

'Gossip columnist Edie O'Dare has enemies and sources, but no friends in a Golden Age Hollywood whose gleam is tarnished by exploitation, cruelty and betrayal. Like a latter-day Cecil B. DeMille, Lindsay Lynch deftly directs her large cast of morally complex characters to illuminate issues of fame and notoriety as relevant now as they were almost a century ago'
Geraldine Brooks, New York Times bestselling author of Horse

'In Do Tell Lindsay Lynch takes a glance back at golden-age Hollywood and captures the fizzy magic, the secret lives, and the deep, destructive misogyny within the industry's DNA. This is a wry, entertaining, and incisive debut'
Lily King, bestselling author of Writers & Lovers